Peace is where Life meets itself as a distant cousin whose face you recognize in someone dear
Whose voice stirs something old and deep and
Calls you back to what you were, still are
Come stand with me at your safe distance
Peace says and when you do
Peace is nighttime staring at the dark and sweeping, cloudless, summer star- bright sky
With your small form standing barelegged on a red-clay road
a cow pasture lined with Goldenrod and Queens Anne’s Lace behind you
and surrounding you
the fragrance of a saltwater marsh tethers your senses to the here and now
and all the while that erstwhile feeling you get
as the trailing tail of a comet explodes your mind into blazing galaxies
far beyond imaginings of long ago
these are the stirrings of Peace
reminding you that eons mean nothing more than the everything of how we all exist
somehow in this great moment of possibility
poised
like a dome shaped skyscape and your cousin’s face and a stranger’s soothing voice reminding you
We All Are One
and Peace is also the Hallelujah of this all set to the hum of ten thousand Cricket’s cricketing
and lapping waves
and everything feels right just for those moments
and even when you remember briefly the reasons it might not be perfect after all
Peace is bearing witness to these rememberings and still choosing a loving pathway forward
Peace is having trauma and still choosing compassion at your next chance
Peace is the inward sweeping motion of the heart to welcome all that’s on the margins
Come in, come in Peace says with kind and smiling eyes
There’s room for you here, the kettle is on,
You’re safe, let’s sit awhile dear friend
Peace is fruits and berries and winter squash and cabbage and corn and potatoes which have been harvested from fields and trees that were tended with care, shared freely
Peace is where the needs of the World are justly reconciled
Peace is those cold and hungry being fed and sheltered
Peace is tending to the sick and elderly with kindness
Peace is fence mending and bridge building and breaking down those walls that are meant to divide and conquer Spirit
Brick by red Earth brick
Peace is the place where loneliness finds a tender companion in joy
Peace is the space between the in breath and the out
And the trust that allows that space to exist
Peace is making our little circles wider to accommodate more needs
Peace is watching concentric circles form after still waters are broken by a dropping stone, a diving duck, a jumping fish and feeling grateful for each one
Peace is the ripple and the dip between the waves and
The calm before the storm when the storm is all of life
And in that storm Peace is you remembering to be quiet and just breathe
Peace is this ritual of quieting
Peace is the listening that happens when you quiet
Peace is the quiet
And from that quiet
Peace is the means we communicate desire for reform
through reconciliation
inclusion
And holding space
Peace is an avenue through which all languages become known in the one language of the heart
Peace is the truth of bravery in the face of great difficulty
World Peace--my wish with every birthday candle I blew out on childhood birthday cakes
World Peace isn’t possible
I was told by adults when I grew up and braved my heart to share my childlike wishes
It isn’t possible because the world exists thanks to the constant motions of flux they said
But to me
Peace is bowing to those motions of flux in honouring
sharing in their bounties
allowing those natural harmonies to
sing out beautifully in the natural world
with far less interference
Peace is knowing the Air has the right to exist for its own existence and respecting that
That Water has the right to be clean and life giving and respecting that
That Soil has the right to live and thrive without being damaged and depleted and respecting that
Peace knows this delicate natural harmony the living world depends upon for myriad existences has the right to exist of its own accord and respecting that
Peace is making heart space enough to heal a broken world beginning now
Peace is a Monarch Butterfly’s wings fluttering on the breeze and a chrysalis on Milkweed
Peace is the whisk like call of the Nelson’s Sparrow in a saltwater marsh in evening time
Peace is a choice we can all make towards healing
Peace is saying yes to clean foods and no to chemicals and pesticides
And quietly living your choices with a calm heart and mind
Peace means harming is not a pathway to more
Not individually nor globally
Peace understands enough
Peace requires pauses
Peace demands action
There is so simulacrum for Peace
Yet the beauty of true Peace shines like moonlight on the Water
showing the way forward for us to respond
In the darkness
Shining on apples
Shining on sweet hay
Shining on the leaves that turn colours in autumn
Shining in the eyes of children who are allowed to be themselves
Shining on the tidal pools where all the minutiae of the mulitverse play out
Birth, Living, Death, Rebirth
Peace is saying
I am Willing
Willing to plant the Seed of Peace in my heart in the good faith that, if nurtured, one day it will bloom
and the whole world will make posies of it
I lay down myself to all this in its honour…
I hand you a Seed
Wishing you Peace
Jill MacCormack
Originally written for Art for Autism's 5th annual Poetry and Art for Peace Sept 2020
*As an addendum to this piece I want to share that this work comes from my own heart's wish for peace both for my own self and this world yet the past two weeks have been ones of considerable personal struggle for me and mine and my heart has not always been a peaceful one on our journey as a family moving through difficult terrain. I bow down in recognition of my own need to create peace in my own heart first and to the beauty of trusting that peace to radiate out to those I love most and onward to this blessed, hurting, oh so beautiful, world.
Thanks to Lucas MacCormack for the photograph of me taken on the cape in Monticello in late August.
In Peace,
Be well,
Jill
Keep writing Jill- it's beautiful. ma