You are Loved

The anger comes in waves. A slow powerful swell that leaves me raw and feeling useless. Then quick jabs. An uppercut. I am numb. The seeds of rage grow into sprouts of hate. It at this moment of the beating that I breathe. Stop.

I scroll through all the images. I read all the words. Starving children sit besides the corpses of their parents. I see Kaia standing there. My eyes flash open. It is too unbearable to imagine. I see her awash in a fear that is beyond the ability of any one person to endure, let alone a child. A lone child. Who will she become without the love of her parents? Watching them bleed away to nothing. Their murders ignored or branded as self-defense.

How did we get here? I push back the hatred. It is in my heart, just like yours that hatred grows. And it is here that we must fight it. Push it back with all our force. I will carry this anger only so far. My back aches with the weight of the world again. My heart goes to the oppressed everywhere they suffer the injustice of hate. But anger does no one any good.

Please do not take my words to mean that we should ignore the anger we feel when we see injustice. Just the opposite, we must acknowledge the anger, carry it a while and feel its weight, find its source. Let it soak into every fiber of our being, but from that soil we must transform it to love.

Love for our enemies, love for the monsters that kill children in their schools. Love for armies who ban medical help for the people they butcher. We must learn to love those that commit evil, because our hatred only fuels their crimes.

Terrified young men assault each other with missiles and bullets, because they were not able to defeat the hatred in their hearts. Broken men, brainwashed with the fantasies of older men follow orders because the fear in their hearts is too much to bear.

How else do you explain neighbors who kill each other’s children over such meaningless things as borders and gods? Lost in ancient stories, these men have forgotten how to create love and spread it to those who beg for it.

All I can do these dark nights is sit with my anger and prick myself wake from the numbness. There is light to shed in my heart still. I hope this light translates from these words and touches someone who may be reading. If not, if I am alone, I know that this light will not simply disappear into the universe. Perhaps somehow my thoughts will find there way to that little girl standing next to her dead mother. And they will simple say, “you are not alone. I am here in your heart. I love you. Let everything else go. You are loved.”