To Change What Must Be Changed- two poems for quiet people

Ring the bells that still can ring.
Forget your perfect offering.
There is a crack in everything.
That's how the light gets in.
~Leonard Cohen

Dear friends, these two poems came in the form of guidance- as I've been longing to contribute to change, but in a way that might be quieter than the norm. I offer these two poems, imperfect as they are, in hopes some light might pour through them if anyone else might need them.

To Change What Must Be Changed

What if, at least for today,
quiet was your gift? And grief?
What if listening was, for this moment,
all you had to freely offer?
Even though your heart is breaking
and you know what it is you must do.

What if honesty, confusion, humility,
stillness, tattered devotion?
What if love, compassion, openness,
welcoming or wonder?
What if praise? For surely,
isn't praise,
finer, at least, than greed?

What if light? If hope?
...would you withhold these
quiet gifts?
How will we find our way
to belovedness, to belonging?
How will we nourish a world
that was intended as home for all?

What if longing? What if imagining?
What if beauty, a love note, or song?
Will you let your heart rise
to do its holy work?

What if your spirit
was your gift?

~Ingrid Goff-Maidoff

When heart speaks to heart,
it is love that is transmitted.
~Sai Baba

AT THE PROTEST

Even when voice-box
words won't come,
quietly, still,
I bring along my heart.
Because my heart,
and I know this,
speaks with other hearts,
and a love-bond is created.
Even when my temper swells
yet I can not find words
or speak them,
quietly, still, my heart
goes about its loving work.
Yours does too.
Did you know this?

~Ingrid Goff-Maidoff