I should be changing the world
one inner voice keeps saying
but I seemed to decide
some time ago
to let the world change me,
an horrific thought
when courage demands
preserve the self at any cost.
Not the world of block and brick
but the hidden fire within the leaf,
the whale’s eye alive with light
to see in darkness.
Let the shaper shape
with tears and sorrow,
joy and gladness
and before I’m done be
what that cry of hope
one night long ago intended.

Glass sculpture by Linda Ethier