DECENCY

Decency,
That preeminent civic or political virtue,
Reflected in the smallest of things.
The held door or tongue,
The gentle nod when passing,
The patient smile when listening.
Is in decline,
And has been for some years now,
We know it.
In the face of a tidal wave of reaction,
We are unsure what to do next.
We struggle to find,
the lost art of conversation
We are a tribe of story tellers.
Stories,
The things in our hearts that try and make sense of what’s happened.
That tell us and teach us what we didn’t know,
About ourselves and each other.
Having the decency to wait,
to hear our stories and speak our own,
Could change everything.