Digging deeper

Hanging broken and limp like the wing of a fallen eagle, the flag guarding the entrance into the Peace Garden took as bad a beating by the wind this past week as liberal democracy did in Australia on Saturday when the far right conservative party was re-elected with control of both houses of Parliament.

All the moral aspects of governance, that for eight years have been lacking in the Liberal Party’s platform of pro-business, pro-war and anti-environmental and social concerns, is back on the back burner again languishing for want of an informed public.

In Tasmania, for a brief moment preceding the election date, it seemed our mighty forests, under a newly elected Federal Labor government, would be handed a reprieve and taken off the death row of impending clearfelling and wood chipping. Sadly, not to be. To have gotten so close, only to have moved backward, is an almost crushing burden many hearts in the Tasmanian Green movement will have to carry. The equivalent situation in America would be if Bush was not only re-elected, but with an even greater majority in Congress despite all the efforts of everyone to bring about change.

Today is the fourth morning after the deluge. It is dawn with the sun just breaking over the eastern hills and I am at the Peace Fire asking for guidance and looking inside myself to see where there is the strength to pick up the flag, mount it on yet, another pole, and set it waving again.

A gust of wind comes up blowing through the mature South Esk pines encircling the Peace Fire. Millions of grains of pollen fill the air not unlike the magic moment when the coral reefs release their billions of eggs into the vastness of the ocean’s currents, and I am encased in a very potent fog of red dust.

It is a very strange experience; almost miraculous in its timing.

And then the answer comes to me. All of us, especially those elders among us; those with a few more years of experiencing life in its fullness; those who have been at the forefront of environmental and social change; and those of us who have touched the void before and have come back with a deeper wisdom, we have to remain virile in body and spirit. We can never give up on the spreading of seeds of change.

This is a cry from the heart to embrace the day, feet planted into the earth and arms thrust upward into the sky and beyond to the stars. Let fly into the air seeds of hope, stories of love, words of delight for all things green, all creatures great and small. Constantly sing up the earth. Breath in fear and despair and blow out a never ending stream of activity; of decent activity. And the stronger our exhale, the farther our seeds will travel.

It is true that in our lifetime we might not see the fruit of the seeds we have planted. But it is so very important to keep planting them, despite what seems as hopeless odds; despite the seeming unjustness of it all; despite just wanting to curl up in bed and face the wall.

If we’re in the “wilderness” for a few more years, so be it. Just remember what Shakespeare’s Duke Senior had to say about this:

“Sweet are the uses of adversity,
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head;
And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in everything:
I would not change it.”

And so, I commit myself to continue on with the Work; to spread, in as compassionate a manner as possible, the message of peace; to use what skills I have to foster a dialogue for change; to be open for change myself; to develop new skills where needed; and never let a day slip past without savouring for a moment the deliciousness of life.

Shakespere, As You Like It