Wednesday, November 22, 2006

Thanksgiving Grace

My best friend’s mother died today, my son’s wife’s Matriarch is struck.
And two colleagues and close-held guides do battle in their bloodstreams and

their guts

Against malignant, migratory doom. Oncology now governs all our hours, ights and lives.

So, will we kneel and offer heartfelt gratitude?
Why Yes ! We Will.

The persecuted, migrant, haunted Pilgrims did.
Their food and safety could be traced to savages
Once feared as cannibals and foragers on human life.


O, how does this occur, that displaced tribes swallow the urge
To lessen danger by devouring strangers and deign to feed
Invaders from the maize hills, turkey flocks and yam roots saved for frost ?

There must be secret magic here...There must be
More than Mohawk-Erie-Iroquois largesse
And hospitality afoot.

For, boiled down, dry-dstilled,
There was, in each unique God’s child
At that first Thanksgiving,, a personal, burning gratitude
That echoed Grace, where even Native Indian saw
The silhouette of generous humility met
With tempered glee for having life and hope.

Amazing surely was the Grace that flowed from the same root wellspring
In Romance tongues as "Grazie" from Italian ones and "Gracias" from Castile.

Thanksgiving’s not for things we have, but Grace to take
The times we did not ask for; and, stirred with Hope we’ll be surprised by Joy.