will we remember?

A new installation of cascading poppies has just been opened in Belfast Museum. Not earth-shattering you might say. But here, in this wee place I call home, this fragile flower has all too often been portrayed as an issue that divides us rather than unites us. Without rehearsing the history, it has to do with our convoluted history and, in extremis, a "Britishness/oppression" narrative. Whatever the history, the fragility of the flower speaks to me of the frailty of us all. I am compelled to remember, lest I forget, the atrocities man has inflicted on man. The masculine noun is meant. I leave you with some words penned by a famour Irish spiritual leader John O'Donohue.

“On that day when the weight deadens on your shoulders
and you stumble, may the clay dance to balance you.
And when the ghost of loss gets into you,
may a flock of colors — indigo, red, green, and azure blue —
come to awaken in you a meadow of delight.
When the canvas frays
and the stain of ocean blackens beneath you,
may there come across the waters a path of yellow moonlight
to bring you safely home.
May the nourishment of the earth be yours,
may the clarity of light be yours,
may the fluency of the ocean be yours,
may the protection of the ancestors be yours,
and so may a slow wind work these words of love around you,
an invisible cloak to mind your life.”
~ John O’Donohue, Anam Chara.