INTOLERANCES Poem by Andrea Cote

It is not the same thing to say I forgive
the long wait,
the quiet,
the grief,
the oak sadness of the rooms
and of things there weighing down.
It is not the same thing to say
that I forgive that,
or that I do not see
importance
or excess
in the happy unconsciousness of trees
but I do see it
instead
in saying
that the world thus
- hard-fought or razed -
sometimes was
an awkward voice,
unincitable,
that thinks stones are immobile
and that their stillness
of time and sorrow
and your own eyes
are what there is
and nothing more.

For I forgive
because the unconscious beauty of things
is beautiful
as is the ungovernable
breeze
but also
as is sad,
unforgivable
and grey
the appearance
of the men without faith
and the muffled stillness
that intact beings
and things have.