Scarlet

Middle of nowhere
Finally you can breathe
Nobody knows your name
It's easier

Shut your eyes tightly
Clench your fists 'til they almost bleed
Cautiously, lightly
Gently expose what's underneath

And all you feel now
Is the scarlet in your day
Even it's real
You can't stay

So there you go
You're gone for good
There you go
You're gone for good

Your mind is swollen
From months of thought without release
They've taken their toll on you
This very moment
Of timid and fragile honesty
Is precious and rare and fleeting

And all you feel now
Is the scarlet in your day
Even it's real
You can't stay

‘...it is a process, a continual struggle. But it is a necessary step toward redeeming an unjust past, underpinned by notions of restorative and transformative justice, and, of course human rights. Only through such a restorative process can normalisation be achieved.’

Jeff Halper

To me it seems rather Christlike to be as unadorned as this place is, as little regarded. I can’t help imagining that you will leave sooner or later, and it’s fine if you have done that, or you mean to do it. This whole town does look like whatever hope becomes after it begins to weary a little, then weary a little more. But hope deferred is still hope. I love this town. I think sometimes of going into the ground here as a last wild gesture of love–I too will smolder away the time until the great and general incandescence. (Gilead by Marilynne Robinson, pg. 247)

"That’s the thing about a human life-there’s no control group, no way to ever know how any of us would have turned out if any variables had been changed."

— Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia)

"There is so much about my fate that I cannot control, but other things do fall under the jurisdiction. I can decide how I spend my time, whom I interact with, whom I share my body and life and money and energy with. I can select what I can read and eat and study. I can choose how I'm going to regard unfortunate circumstances in my life-whether I will see them as curses or opportunities. I can choose my words and the tone of voice in which I speak to others. And most of all, I can choose my thoughts."

— Elizabeth Gilbert (Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia)

I will set my eyes upon them for good. I will build them up, and not tear them down; I will plant them, and not pluck them up. Jeremiah 24:6

Steal my heart and hold my tongue.
I feel my time, my time has come.
Let me in, unlock the door.
I've never felt this way before.
The wheels just keep on turning,
The drummer begins to drum,
I don't know which way I'm going,
I don't know which way I've come.
Hold my head inside your hands,
I need someone who understands.
I need someone, someone who hears,
For you, I've waited all these years.
For you, I'd wait 'til kingdom come.
Until my day, my day is done.
And say you'll come, and set me free,
Just say you'll wait, you'll wait for me.
In your tears and in your blood,
In your fire and in your flood,
I hear you laugh, I heard you sing,
"I wouldn't change a single thing.
"The wheels just keep on turning,
The drummers begin to drum,
I don't know which way I'm going,
I don't know what I've become.
For you, I'd wait 'til kingdom come,
Until my days, my days are done.
Say you'll come and set me free,
Just say you'll wait, you'll wait for me.
Just say you'll wait, you'll wait for me.
Just say you'll wait, you'll wait for me.

(Coldplay)