A Moment to breathe

Sometimes quietly, and other times embarrassingly loud, they live among us. The people we don't really want to be, and sometimes wish we didn't know, but most often are secretly grateful for. This poem made me think of them and how they are changing our community this year. For better or worse, they move us ahead.

The Rest of Us
Mark Smith-Soto

speaking truth to power is all right for heroes.

it's easy for them to sit at the front of the bus

and look out the window while the bus driver yells

and the rest of us squirm and sweat in our seats,

how sweet those bitter yelled words to heroes, how

they feel the lash like the smile of God upon them!

they lie down in front of the tanks, they stand up

to the firing squad, they hold their hearts in their hands

and laugh in a place deep inside with all of us watching,

we who quiver to strike out, scared to catch duck flu,

to take off our shoes outside the temple and walk in

singing - all of us unready, unwilling, unraveling at

stray dogs, salmonella, panhandlers, fundamentalists, rabid

squirrels, ugly shoes, bad breath, shingles, and love -

how are we supposed to say stop it, stop it! stop it!

when we are afraid to stop in dark places, afraid not

to stop and be polite to the corner santa claus,

to the president, the dogcatcher, the dentist.

is it any wonder when we hate them, the heroes, is it

any wonder we hang them from hemlocks, tear off

their halos, let loose on them the wild dogs

of our hateful admiration? they make life so hard

with their secret smiles beyond any comfort or pleasure,

their prideful steps beyond any arrogance, their

awful aloneness that doesn't need us - don't they see

how difficult they make it for us, how we would like

to give them a loan, a medal, a charitable foundation,

anything, if they would only stop being themselves

for a minute, and just give us a chance to breathe!