The Feathers of Peace

The Feathers of Peace

Pure and white are the wings that bear peace

ancient are the messenger feathers of the covenant

sins, floods, condemnations and pardons

then there is Noah, animals saved in pairs

They come lightly out of nowhere

white feathers of silence and fable

they glide slowly above the noise of the world

They fall mute over cradle and grave

They are feathers of peace

carried by a dove

A dove –

to Noah brought an olive branch

buds of new hope

in a world that was devoid of it

A dove –

descended upon Christ,

the water of the Jordan opened to the voice of Heaven:

‘You are my beloved Son’

Peace to you, who are chosen

A dove –

still flies among our days

among our spaces, among our torments

Peace is not the absence of war

It is God’s presence on earth

It is harmony that arises

when man sees the other and his mystery

the divine in every face

the eternal in every creature,

then – and only then –

peace will be lasting

Peace is albedo of the no longer solitary soul,

white blooming after night

nigredo withdraws, defeated but necessary

It is written:

‘He is our peace, he who of the two has made one’ (Eph 2:14).

Two become one in the Crucified One

and the One embraces every two

And so peace is Christ, not a word, a deed

Not a pact

but a person

Peace is not tolerance

I tolerate you, but I do not love you

nothing exists if it is not loved

‘love your enemies and pray for your persecutors, that you may be children of your heavenly Father, who makes his sun rise on the wicked and on the good, and makes it rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous’ (Mt 5:44-45)

God is in the One

the One is love

Honour to your face

bears the imprint of God

He who looks at another and does not see God is still blind

He who caresses a flower and does not feel the sacred is still mute

He who listens to a child and does not sense the infinite still has no ears for peace

Peace is a spiritual act

an alphabet that only an angel speaks

Poetry is translating it, poetry is shouting the Gospel

But peace is also rhyme

rhyme of love with reality

freedom and truth

The dove is not weak, it is proud

it is fragile, but true

It brings peace because it has been through war

Only he who has wept can smile

Only he who has kept silent can sow words in the earth

There is no money to buy these feathers

Peace is not summed up, it is not inflicted

and is not imposed by law

It rains feathers suspended in the wind

meanwhile, slowly slowly, the world wakes up

and finds itself one family

The dove has laid the egg

the new man is born

The contemporary revels in conflict and ends up tolerating at best

the postcontemporary is first of all to love