Feeling helpless, even after volunteering, we invented a ritual. Like the smoke of burned prayers, or releasing the dead in canoes…

Sitting in the grass, with a view of water through trees, we look closely at each other, till the core love rises.

We look closely in front of us, starting with the grass that lines our thighs, out to the horizon and the afterglow.

We each hold a hundred dollar bill, for the wherewithal to enjoy, and to help.  Asking for more, to have impact at scale…

And so on.  Assume that we’re now peaceful, clear.  In front of us is tremendous light.  Behind us is the world.

Now what?  We can’t be there in the room with Israel and Hamas.  Can’t speak to Putin or imprison him. 

So we sit, trying to…send.  Two figures dwarfed even by the grass. 

We spread our arms.  I feel the blasts of the shofar pass through me and on to the hostages, to the people of Gaza. 

The view:  pale blue-silver of night water, sense of new oxygen, this bird lifting off:  I try to pass it on, in a cloud that will reach and cover Israel, cover Ukraine.  Reach the homeless. That this good can rain on them, that they feel the force of my intentions, and it somehow helps.

But they may also taste the bile of my frustration, a new cynicism, burning their lips, their skin. It’s all so entrenched…

Next to me, you’re sending love.  Your intentions amplified by the Shekhinah.  Fighting off images of horror, you send out wave after wave. 

Her eyes are still closed.  I look around.  Behind her the tiny lizards are standing up in the grass, basking.  The man who’d been lying on a bench is sitting up.  He’s smiling and crying, tapping his heart.  Good signs.  Promising…