Analysis of The Thought That Lingers: Part Eleven

The thought that lingers in our times…
Is that of war; in times of peace.
Wars of every culture…
Wars of tribes, wars of nations.
Wars too of religion.

Then there are wars of gender, wars of hatred.
And there are always wars of passion.
There are always wars against liberty.
There are wars and rumors of war.
There are wars of the human heart.

These wars deny us freedom.
These wars plague our souls.
These wars bring us death in their wake.
These wars invoke greed and selfishness.
These wars diminish us.

These wars create a strident theme of theft.
A theft of everything that makes us human.
These wars limit our choices…
Negate our moral fortitude.
These wars create our own purgatory.

And yet a child of war can lead the way.
A wounded war torn child…
Can turn men’s hearts from warfare.
Can offer us another, even better choice
Can show us how, by loving, we can care.

Let us now turn to look upon such child.
A war torn child; rising from the ashes to compose —
To compose her self to write…
With bombs bursting in the air, she writes…
Bleeding the pages of her diary with love.

Lodged as she is, so hidden in her ‘Secret Annex’…
Her hiding place becoming her Pandora’s Box.
A place not of comfort, but a catacomb…
A place to garner strength
To petition insight even in greatest darkness.

This is our heroine of the holocaust.
This is our maiden of the Secret Annex
Ensconced, enclosed; enveloped by the scourge of war.
This is the story of Anne Frank…
Whose diary will be an account of courage amidst warfare’s atrocities.

And so a diary of warfare in sooth…
Becomes indeed a diary of peace and love.
A diary of finding light…
Even in the greatest darkness.
A handmaiden’s diary to transform men’s hearts.

“O Dearest Anne Frank…
While encased in ‘Dora’s Box…
Favored by Mercurial spirits to write.
Your words of passion burn evermore in our hearts.
Invigorate our souls with newfound hope.

“O Dearest Anne Frank…
Promethean Hope you provide us.
Olympian dreams you raise up…
To emblazon us with love.
To keep Hope still alive.

“O Child of Hope, O Child of Love…
O precious war torn child…
O all ye children of the world.
You are our legacies of hope.
You are the prize we have; and must keep.

“O Ancient Ones…
Let our children’s dreams not be deterred!
Let their innocence prevail!
Let their wisdom serve as guide!
To stir men’s hearts anew to love.

“When Hope is but a shadow pale…
When Hope is placed without much light…
Beseech a child to show The Way.
O Ancient Ones, beseech us all to listen…
To seek the light, not darkness.”

At Pringsengnacht; Two Sixty Three in
Amsterdam…
There — dwells the Secret Annex.
It is a shrine to honor peace; the scourge of war forget.
That light will always shine to overcome darkness.

For images of war are thoughts…
Are thoughts of ugliness.
These thoughts of bitterness become transformed…
By healing teardrops of a child…
Who weeps with joy of hope.

Let’s honor Anne Frank’s words of hope.
And those of other children like her.
Who see the world as what it really ought to be…
Instead of how we often fashion it.
Let there dwell within our hearts a Secret Annex of Love!

That is the potent thought we seek to linger.
That is the thought we wish to bear fruit.
That is the childlike thought we cherish.
For of such thought is the Kingdom of Heaven.
And of such thoughts, to have all our children lead The Way.