The Darkness Around Us Is Deep

     Today is the New Moon. The snowy peak of Mount McLoughlin pierces the blue sky. Rose hips hang heavy as lipstick kisses on bare, brown branches. In the murky depths of our pond the fish lie "sleeping". 
         Each day we give thanks for the beauty of this life. We try to remember also, gratitude for the hard things. Right now we are driving South through the Rogue Valley with the sun and the snowy peak, the rosehip kisses and somewhere the sleeping fish. I turn off the radio.
My thirteen year old son just asked me
                                  what a sanctuary city is.
I explain.
​He shakes his head and stares out the window in silence for a long time.
    There are countless stories of the new moon. One of my favorites tells of the moon coming to Earth and getting trapped in a hole. She is there for a long time. Until at last the people of the village remember her and together they rescue her, releasing her beautiful light into the night once more.  
     In the car I remember at last to breathe. I toussle my sons hair gently. "We are lucky." I say. "This moment has so much to offer, and we are here to recieve it. The choices we make now, together as a people, have the power to change the course of history." This has always been so.
                                             -----
     I love this poem like an old friend. I love it so much I find I have been shy to share it... as though it were mine. Funny, because the title is, "A Ritual To Read To Each Other". It's by William Stafford. And I realized that one way to honor it was to read it to you... 

"A Ritual To Read To Each Other"  
If you don't know the kind of person I am 
and I don't know the kind of person you are 
a pattern that others made may prevail in the world 
and following the wrong god home we may miss
  our star.
For there is many a small betrayal in the mind, 
a shrug that lets the fragile sequence break 
sending with shouts the horrible errors of
 childhood 
storming out to play through the broken dike.
And as elephants parade holding each
 elephant's tail, 
but if one wanders the circus won't find the
 park, 
I call it cruel and maybe the root of all cruelty 
to know what occurs but not recognize the fact.
And so I appeal to a voice, to something
 shadowy, 
a remote important region in all who talk: 
though we could fool each other, we should
 consider--
lest the parade of our mutual life get lost in the
 dark.
For it is important that awake people be awake,
or a breaking line may discourage them back to
 sleep; 
the signals we give — yes or no, or maybe --
should be clear: the darkness around us is deep.
​--William Stafford