the future judge of the past

 

a burden from the past

it is 2026,

my father died in 1962,

my father was born in 1905,

his uncles fought in the War Between the States,

only called the Civil War because the North won,

my father was named for an uncle killed in the conflict,

for Daddy, this conflict was not dry facts,

but rather it was personal, recent, an assault on his family,

I hate to leap into that world

and imagine how I would deal with slavery,

maybe not with enslaving others,

but accepting that such a reality

was part of the natural order,

I wonder if people in the future will judge us

for persisting with the use of fossil fuels

and the climate change they inexorably cause,

our species always tends to crave more, never less,

and thus we create a reality

that can deny us even the comfort of needing to be a bit hungry,

we satiate ourselves,

and, in the night, wonder at our unease.

by Henry H. Walker

May 8, ‘26

seeing all students truly

 dispensable

I long ago wrote that a goal of a teacher

should be to make yourself dispensable:

like a crutch that can be discarded,

like a meal that is only a means, not an end,

like a hand up and then you're on your way,

many of my former students I saw clearly to their heart,

I could see behind their eyes who they were

when they let themselves out,

that part of them struggling to break free into the Light,

other students I loved just as deeply,

but I could not see them as clearly,

and I did not know them as truly,

it is tragic when any student

can not see themselves truly,

to me, it is amazing

when such a student perseveres

into finding their way forward,

the credit for such progress is all to them,

a seed can find itself on challenging ground

and it still reaches toward the sky,

such a transcendence deserves to be seen and celebrated

for the power of its rising comes because it is true to itself,

and to the possibilities only it can be sure to know,

true to the choices it makes every day

to live the best life that can open itself unto the world.

by Henry H. Walker

May 6, ‘26

a stumble, or a soar

 

commonality in difference

when I look at somebody's eyes,

I can often see past the surface

and see the unique microcosm

that is that of God within them,

a self that is ready to fly,

but is also ready to retreat from the leap,

I particularly feel for any beset with doubt

who feel a clumsiness within

that can lead to a stumble instead of the soar,

we work hard these days to open ourselves

to finding any commonality within our diversity,

whether it be from gender, or opinion

or the balance of our humours,

I am gifted, and cursed, with empathy,

with powerful emotions that throw me

into whatever fray exists around me,

I sorrow when I see the extraordinary in another

when it seems that others just see the contrary,

each of us has that of God within us,

and I want to glory in how well it can manifest,

no matter how convoluted, or obscure,

that path to flying can be,

I feel the potential tragedy inherent in difference,

until we can learn to celebrate how much the other is also us,

and then we can grow larger, and closer to God,

when we expand and know the other 

as maybe even better at being itself than we are.

by Henry H. Walker

May 9, ‘26