Those of us who are doing the best we can

Blessed are those of us who are doing the best we can

Whose hearts are broken,

And struggling to know what’s right;

Just wanting to be helpful and loving and just and thoughtful and aware —

We know better than to think these uncomfortable, dreadful, anxious worries will ever completely subside,

But how much more full is our joy, too,

When we know that we didn’t look away,

Or close the door,

Or stay at home

When love was required.

What they didn’t ever tell us was that this love-work doesn’t always make you feel good;

Sometimes it’s messy,

And you’re still not sure

If you did the right thing;

It didn’t go as you thought it would —

No one was grateful, or perhaps they were even angry

Or you are feeling a little loss over what you gave,

When on other days,

It would be easy to say you’d give it all.

Blessed are those devastated by the terror that befalls someone else’s trouble -

so far away you could never feel

The reverberations

Even if they echoed through the earth

Because your feeling of powerlessness

While wanting to save it allIs a suffering in itself

And not something that can be manufactured

And only you know

What is truly in your heart.