Sometimes the world knocks at my door.
I have forgotten to close the curtains,
appear like no-one is at home.
Sometimes the world knocks, like a
tree branch on a cold winter’s night
against a tin roof.
Tap tap, screech.
Sometimes I have forgotten to fall asleep.
Say my prayers. Light candles.
Sometimes the night is a big blackness.
The hardest part, we have not eyes to see.
Sometimes the world knocks
and I will turn over,
pillow against my ears.
How I won’t need to answer what I cannot hear.
Sometimes the world is a night-owl calling.
That long distinctive ‘Eeeeeee’.
And I am a person trapped into listening,
too afraid I might translate the world’s
warnings, her lamentations,
before mistaking them for the wind.
Sometimes the world comes through to me,
a person seeking shelter in a storm.
Whom am I not to pay attention, heed a need.
I think I can only cope if I keep moving.
How that can be our battle plan friends,
to do what the moment asks of us,
no less, and no more.
How did a people live with war?
By taking care of their neighbours.
Keeping stock of shared resources.
Staying up with each other in the storm.
Repeating their prayers, litanies of petitions,
until someone somewhere gives them heed.
Ana Lisa de Jong
Living Tree Poetry
October 2022
(nb. I am slow at getting the body of my work up here on the web
for you to enjoy and use as you will, but bear with me)
Living Tree Poetry 
Yes! All of this! Thank you!
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Thank you Stephen, I know you feel the world knocking too, the trick is to keep loving it though it is painful to hold xx
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