by Laurence Musgrove
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| AI generated graphic from Shutterstock |
This evening, the Buddha and I
sat and scrolled through our phones
before retiring for the night.
I read to him about the latest
retaliation strikes in Syria and Iraq,
and he read to me about our deportation
flights of refugees deep into Mexico
designed to discourage their return
and the hopes of those now streaming
to our razor-wired border.
“It was Thich Nhat Hanh,” he said,
“who wrote our enemies are not people,
but our ideologies, fears, and attachments
to views that justify our ignorance
of cause and effect with absolutely
no guarantee of freedom or peace.
The fires we spread always burn us, too.”
Laurence Musgrove is the author of three poetry collections Local Bird, The Bluebonnet Sutras, and A Stranger's Heart. He teaches creative writing and literature from a Buddhist perspective at Angelo State University in West Texas.