Tuesday, July 18, 2006
Peace Means...
We forgive, not forget
We promote, not deprive
We examine, not deny
We act, not wait for others to act on our behalf.
We connect, despite our differences, and in so doing, discover
we have more in common than we realized.
Peace Asks...
We practice, not perfect
We honor, not destroy
We preserve and protect, not abandon or defile
We lift up and are thus lifted up.
We accept stewardship of our planet, its wildlife and
people - in this generation and in all to come.
Peace Counsels...
We walk more, drive less;
Listen more, speak less;
Laugh more, assume less.
We own our projections of darkness and invoke the Light.
We lead with our best intentions and follow our hearts.
We watch and learn before acting.
We practice restraint and live with a spirit of abundance.
We share resources while protecting equality.
Peace Invites...
We replace our "To Do" lists with time out to "Be"
We commit to "Be the Change", rather than insist the world
change first.
We lessen the grip of the ego and let love rule.
We live with possibility rather than overpowering with
passion.
Peace Insists...
The hungry are fed
The weak are protected
The ill are tended to
The homeless are sheltered -
Sacrificing the wants of a few for the needs of the many.
Peace Requires...
Being open to change, letting go of resistance
Holding on to hope while letting go of struggle
Saying "YES".
Relinquishing fear and finding our courage
Realigning ourselves with all that is positive
Peace Begins by...
Blessing the world with our actions, words, and presence
Creating a culture of trust and belonging
Starting NOW.
Lisa Love
Brunswick
We forgive, not forget
We promote, not deprive
We examine, not deny
We act, not wait for others to act on our behalf.
We connect, despite our differences, and in so doing, discover
we have more in common than we realized.
Peace Asks...
We practice, not perfect
We honor, not destroy
We preserve and protect, not abandon or defile
We lift up and are thus lifted up.
We accept stewardship of our planet, its wildlife and
people - in this generation and in all to come.
Peace Counsels...
We walk more, drive less;
Listen more, speak less;
Laugh more, assume less.
We own our projections of darkness and invoke the Light.
We lead with our best intentions and follow our hearts.
We watch and learn before acting.
We practice restraint and live with a spirit of abundance.
We share resources while protecting equality.
Peace Invites...
We replace our "To Do" lists with time out to "Be"
We commit to "Be the Change", rather than insist the world
change first.
We lessen the grip of the ego and let love rule.
We live with possibility rather than overpowering with
passion.
Peace Insists...
The hungry are fed
The weak are protected
The ill are tended to
The homeless are sheltered -
Sacrificing the wants of a few for the needs of the many.
Peace Requires...
Being open to change, letting go of resistance
Holding on to hope while letting go of struggle
Saying "YES".
Relinquishing fear and finding our courage
Realigning ourselves with all that is positive
Peace Begins by...
Blessing the world with our actions, words, and presence
Creating a culture of trust and belonging
Starting NOW.
Lisa Love
Brunswick
Monday, July 17, 2006
From a collection of cards designed and printed by Nancy March, Brunswick
Thursday, July 13, 2006
from Liz McGhee,
this poem by Mary Oliver:
Wage Peace
Wage peace with your breath.
Breathe in firemen and rubble,
Breathe out whole buildings and flocks of red wing blackbirds.
Breathe in terrorists and
Breathe out sleeping children and freshly mown fields.
Breathe in confusion and breathe out maple trees.
Breathe in the fallen and breathe out lifelong friendships intact.
Wage peace with your listening: hearing sirens, pray loud.
Remember your tools: flower seeds, clothes pins, clean rivers.
Make soup.
Play music, learn the word for thank you in three languages.
Learn to knit, and make a hat.
Think of chaos as dancing raspberries, imagine grief as the out-breath of
beauty or the gesture of fish.
Swim for the other side.
Wage peace.
Never has the world seemed so fresh and precious.
Have a cup of tea and rejoice.
Act as if armistice has already arrived.
Don't wait another minute.
this poem by Mary Oliver:
Wage Peace
Wage peace with your breath.
Breathe in firemen and rubble,
Breathe out whole buildings and flocks of red wing blackbirds.
Breathe in terrorists and
Breathe out sleeping children and freshly mown fields.
Breathe in confusion and breathe out maple trees.
Breathe in the fallen and breathe out lifelong friendships intact.
Wage peace with your listening: hearing sirens, pray loud.
Remember your tools: flower seeds, clothes pins, clean rivers.
Make soup.
Play music, learn the word for thank you in three languages.
Learn to knit, and make a hat.
Think of chaos as dancing raspberries, imagine grief as the out-breath of
beauty or the gesture of fish.
Swim for the other side.
Wage peace.
Never has the world seemed so fresh and precious.
Have a cup of tea and rejoice.
Act as if armistice has already arrived.
Don't wait another minute.
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
Have you noticed?
The curve in the straight line gave no warning.
In the deep of the night, it arrived with the sweetness
of a love song:
Stealth-like in intent, melodious in delivery,
the straight line finally rebelled.
Have you noticed?
Like an earthquake of renewal or, perhaps, a geometry of hope,
this Euclidian revolt has shaken the logic of our lives.
Beginning and ending in the infinity of the circle,
the line-turned-curve leads us to the Eden of our beginning.
Have you noticed?
Hush ......
The line can be heard singing in the stillness of the whole.
Why go straight, if we can embrace?
Why wander endless, if we can meet?
Why say it is just so, and nothing else, if it is, in fact, so much more?
The line-turned-circle is you, it is me, it is us.
To be a circle, not a line, is to be life itself.
Shelley Schweizer
Portland
The curve in the straight line gave no warning.
In the deep of the night, it arrived with the sweetness
of a love song:
Stealth-like in intent, melodious in delivery,
the straight line finally rebelled.
Have you noticed?
Like an earthquake of renewal or, perhaps, a geometry of hope,
this Euclidian revolt has shaken the logic of our lives.
Beginning and ending in the infinity of the circle,
the line-turned-curve leads us to the Eden of our beginning.
Have you noticed?
Hush ......
The line can be heard singing in the stillness of the whole.
Why go straight, if we can embrace?
Why wander endless, if we can meet?
Why say it is just so, and nothing else, if it is, in fact, so much more?
The line-turned-circle is you, it is me, it is us.
To be a circle, not a line, is to be life itself.
Shelley Schweizer
Portland
Peace Requires Your Participation!
My life began the day a major peace treaty was signed!
I have lived a life golden, wondrous and sublime
God gave me the gift of seeing beauty in others
I knew early on that all men were my brothers
Nature calls to me with deep inspiration
My home in rural Maine provides relaxation
Yet God called me to more, now I witness for peace
I stand on a bridge and I pray war will cease
The Department of Peace campaign is also my pet
I signed on as Team Leader, because this bill hasn't passed yet
Check out the website, "MaineDOP.Org" - when you do
You will find a way to make our government work for you!
My ardent desire is to connect more folks in Maine
Through friendship and sharing in peacemaking's name
I ask you to e-mail me if you want to help make peace come true
Write cvistica@mainedop.org and rainbow peace to you!
Cecilia Vistica, Andover
My life began the day a major peace treaty was signed!
I have lived a life golden, wondrous and sublime
God gave me the gift of seeing beauty in others
I knew early on that all men were my brothers
Nature calls to me with deep inspiration
My home in rural Maine provides relaxation
Yet God called me to more, now I witness for peace
I stand on a bridge and I pray war will cease
The Department of Peace campaign is also my pet
I signed on as Team Leader, because this bill hasn't passed yet
Check out the website, "MaineDOP.Org" - when you do
You will find a way to make our government work for you!
My ardent desire is to connect more folks in Maine
Through friendship and sharing in peacemaking's name
I ask you to e-mail me if you want to help make peace come true
Write cvistica@mainedop.org and rainbow peace to you!
Cecilia Vistica, Andover
Sunday, July 09, 2006
Wish for the world
I want parts of the world to look better.
War ain't nothin' to kid around with.
The world is gonna change.
Make it look better.
Persian Gulf still fightin'...
Why is that?
I think we should stay out of war
as much as we can.
I wish for the world to get better.
Charles Holt
Spindleworks
Brunswick
I want parts of the world to look better.
War ain't nothin' to kid around with.
The world is gonna change.
Make it look better.
Persian Gulf still fightin'...
Why is that?
I think we should stay out of war
as much as we can.
I wish for the world to get better.
Charles Holt
Spindleworks
Brunswick
When the animals come to us,
asking for our help,
will we know what they are saying?
When the plants speak to us
in their delicate, beautiful language,
will we be able to answer them?
When the planet herself
sings to us in our dreams,
will we be able to wake ourselves, and act?
Gary Lawless
asking for our help,
will we know what they are saying?
When the plants speak to us
in their delicate, beautiful language,
will we be able to answer them?
When the planet herself
sings to us in our dreams,
will we be able to wake ourselves, and act?
Gary Lawless
Friday, July 07, 2006
Sunday, July 02, 2006
Retort to Apathy
If you can't believe,
then you are not part of the story.
If you choose to collapse,
disbelieve, just
fall on your phallocentric sword,
then you are not part of the story.
Forget it.
We'll forget you, since
you are not part of the story -
the desperate, delicate, dangerous story.
The never ending story of
a country pushing into
the promise of its own democracy.
The story of a country finding again
its original, its indigenous voice -
the true timbre
of its revolution,
the grand reveille
for its untried glory.
A country fine tuning its anthem -
learning to honor all its dead,
realize all its forgotten,
bring in all of its brutalized,
and every one of their ancestors.
If you cannot believe - and hope,
and once again believe,
then I'm sorry,
you simply are not part of the story.
If today's clarion call
can't spring you from
your mass media slumber,
your lack of
investigative determination,
your blurred and sinking vision,
then you are not
part of the story,
or capable of the song.
And damn!
Just a healthy and a hearty
and a hail farewell to you.
Molly Willcox
If you can't believe,
then you are not part of the story.
If you choose to collapse,
disbelieve, just
fall on your phallocentric sword,
then you are not part of the story.
Forget it.
We'll forget you, since
you are not part of the story -
the desperate, delicate, dangerous story.
The never ending story of
a country pushing into
the promise of its own democracy.
The story of a country finding again
its original, its indigenous voice -
the true timbre
of its revolution,
the grand reveille
for its untried glory.
A country fine tuning its anthem -
learning to honor all its dead,
realize all its forgotten,
bring in all of its brutalized,
and every one of their ancestors.
If you cannot believe - and hope,
and once again believe,
then I'm sorry,
you simply are not part of the story.
If today's clarion call
can't spring you from
your mass media slumber,
your lack of
investigative determination,
your blurred and sinking vision,
then you are not
part of the story,
or capable of the song.
And damn!
Just a healthy and a hearty
and a hail farewell to you.
Molly Willcox
From Mary Chris Reese, this poem by Rabindranath Tagore:
Where The Mind is Without Fear
Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
by narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward ...
into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, let my country awake.
Where The Mind is Without Fear
Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high
Where knowledge is free
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
by narrow domestic walls
Where words come out from the depth of truth
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
Where the mind is led forward ...
into ever-widening thought and action
Into that heaven of freedom, let my country awake.
