In the Storm

Some black ducks

were shrugged up

on the shore.

It was snowing

hard, from the east,

and the sea

was in disorder.

Then some sanderlings,

five inches long

with beaks like wire,

flew in,

snowflakes on their backs,

and settled

in a row

behind the ducks --

whose backs were also

covered with snow --

so close

they were all but touching,

they were all but under

the roof of the duck's tails,

so the wind, pretty much,

blew over them.

They stayed that way, motionless,

for maybe an hour,

then the sanderlings,

each a handful of feathers,

shifted, and were blown away

out over the water

which was still raging.

But, somehow,

they came back

and again the ducks,

like a feathered hedge,

let them

crouch there, and live.

If someone you didn't know

told you this,

as I am telling you this,

would you believe it?

Belief isn't always easy.

But this much I have learned --

if not enough else --

to live with my eyes open.

I know what everyone wants

is a miracle.

This wasn't a miracle.

Unless, of course, kindness --

as now and again

some rare person has suggested --

is a miracle.

As surely it is.

We live so much in a world where we are quick to blame our human species for all its shortcomings. The more we know about the harm we do, which is so easily seen on the internet as disasters and the killing of cultures and ecosystem, the more dsipiratied we become about our kind.

I am reminded of a quote from the Movie, Contact, where the advanced species says during first contact between our species and another:

You're an interesting species, an interesting mix. You're capable of such beautiful dreams and such horrible nightmares. You feel so lost, so cut off, so alone, only you're not. See, in all our searching, the only thing we've found that makes the emptiness bearable is each other.

We are an interesting mix. We evolved for such judgment, competition, and violence. We also evolved for compassion, collaboration, and kindness. If we keep our eyes open we can see that tragedy is never far from beauty, nor violence from kindness. I write this as if it this concession is easily given. It is difficult to accept all of who we are. Perhaps the miracle then isn't that we can be kind and forgiving, but that we can be grateful for it when the storms of life might as easily sweep us into oblivion, and might in the very next moment. So there is no time to waste.

Kindness first! For ducks, sanderlings, humans, and all beings.

Because for me, living is not about belief in God or miracles. I'm with the Dali Lama who said: My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness.

Where have you seen or known kindness recently? Is it "enough?"