Sirens
by Billy Collins
Not those women who lure sailors
onto a reef with their singing and their tresses,
but the screams of an ambulance
bearing the sick, the injured, and the dying
across the rational grid of the city.
We get so used to the sound
it’s just another sharp in the city’s tune.
Yet it’s one thing to stop on a sidewalk
with other pedestrians to watch one
flashing and speeding down an avenue
while a child on a corner covers her ears
and a shopkeeper appears in a doorway,
but another thing when one gets stuck
in traffic and seems to be crying for its mother
who has fled to another country.
Everyone keeps walking along then,
eyes cast down—for after all,
there’s nothing we can do,
and today we are not the one peering
up at the face of an angel dressed in scrubs.
Some of us are late for appointments
a few blocks away, while others
have the day off and take their time
angling across a broad, leafy avenue
before being engulfed by the green of a park.
“Sirens” by Billy Collins from The Rain in Portugal. © Random House, 2016.
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 2022
“Brothers and sisters, the power of Jesus is love. Jesus gives us the power to love in this way, which for us seems superhuman. This ability, though, cannot be merely the result of our own efforts; it is primarily the fruit of God’s grace. A grace that must be implored insistently: “Jesus, you who love me, teach me to love like you. Jesus, you who forgive me, teach me to forgive like you. Send your Spirit, the Spirit of love, upon me.” Let us ask for this grace. So often we bring our requests before the Lord, but what is essential for us as Christians is to know how to love as Christ loves. His greatest gift is the ability to love, and that is what we receive when we make room for the Lord in prayer, when we welcome his presence in his transforming word and in the revolutionary humility of his broken Bread. Thus, slowly, the walls that harden our hearts tumble, and we find our joy in carrying out works of mercy towards everyone.”
Pope Francis
The Vibrant Channeled Creator 