Mankind must remember
that peace is not
God's gift to his creatures:
peace is our gift to each other.
~Elli Wiesel
Judith Rafaela and Nancy Fay have selected 140 poems to promote peace. In a similar way to the poems in Written with a Spoon (about food), these poems are about the thoughts we feed our minds in order to gain a new perspective on our present condition. Since the world is in turmoil and change is inevitable, poetry can provide moments of peaceful contemplation. One line of poetry could affect you profoundly. It could bring back memories from your childhood, or even give you hope for the future.
I absolutely loved the poem: Feeling My Way Through The Dark which describes awakening to a nest of stars and how Christine Hemp is convinced the world is not where she will always stay. She feels the pull of the stars and for a moment, she is lost in gazing beyond shadows that change shape. While her poem seems to speak of eternal life or a life beyond this current existence, Penny Harter's poem: The Serengeti Plains focuses on the cycle of life and brought an entirely new perspective to death itself.
When blood runs into the grass
it is not death that seeps
into this soil, but starlight
on its journey through the dark.
While reading D.A. Feinfeld's poem about the Blood of a Poet, the last six lines struck me as rather profound and this was the third poem that impressed me and created a new awareness of life itself. Hans Jorg Stahlschmidt's poem about the Writer shows the power of our words and dreams.
I think the poem that was the most meaningful to me was: At The Kitchen Table.
All your poet wife
can think of
is that you've got to see the
early autumn sunset
a nearly perfect shade of
violet
slipping into gold-tinged apricot
What a beautiful book filled with poems about the appreciation for life itself that can lead to a more peaceful existence. Some of the poets are observing, some are awakening your awareness, many are wishing the world would see life from the perspective of a poet.
The cover (not yet shown) is a navy blue with a swirl of cream paint that appears to resemble the moon appearing from dark clouds or a circle of life. It could also be O for ONE peaceful world.
~The Rebecca Review