Poem #3: Honoring Maya Angelou: Be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud

Focus on negativity
News overflowing with fear-mongering
Pandemic and still more pandemic
Scared to death and fear of each other and fear of going outside
Masks and violence and protests and unrest and brutality
Is there nothing good in the world?
Be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud.

Log on and you’ll see the worst aspects of human behavior
Listen to young people and they’ll share their heightened anxiety
So fear grows and grows. Is it overtaking the globe?
Trapped inside, mental health issues and violence expands.
We witness the worst parts of human nature. Over and over.
Will there be a second wave? Facing our own mortality.
Is this the end of the world? What is normal?
Judging others’ choices. When will there be a vaccine?
Be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud.

Shut off the news.
Spread kindness ~ to loved ones and strangers.
Exercise. Your mind as well as your physical being.
Listen. Focus on the good. What you focus on increases.
Experience gratitude. Know that we will get through this.
Optimism is the best cure. Hope transforms poverty. We’ve got this.
Be a rainbow in someone else’s cloud.

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