Do They Hear Birds?

Today I heard the harsh cawing of a crow

I wonder if they hear birds

Or only the sound of rockets…in Gaza?

Today I saw a small girl sprint out of an elementary school

 Zipping up a Barbie backpack

Perhaps it held a   crumpled permission slip to be signed

I wonder if mothers are still writing names on their children’s arms

So they can be identified after bombings, in Gaza?

Today when I returned to my home

  I saw the spiny brown centers of coneflowers,

Survivors of a summer garden invited to return next year

Gas flames on my burners to cook spaghetti

Water out of my faucet to drink

I wonder what returning families will find

Besides rubble, in Gaza?

What can one person thousands of miles away do to stop the bloodshed

Like many others, I hoped  the sweetness of silence

Would inch both sides toward peace.

Yet another refugee camp bombed today

Dozens dead, mostly children – in Gaza.

Powerless to act in face of unimaginable suffering

I pray.

Do not be daunted

By the enormity of the world’s grief

Do Justly, now.

Love mercy, now.

Walk humbly, now.

You are not obligated to complete the work.

But neither are you free to abandon it.

--- The Talmud