"The weight of nothing"
"Tell me the weight of a snowflake", a coal-mouse asked a wild dove.
"Nothing more than nothing", was the answer.
"In that case, I must tell you a marvellous story" the coal-mouse
said. "I sat on the branch of a fir tree, close to its trunk, when it
began to snow, not heavily, not in a raging blizzard, no, just like in a
dream, without any violence. Since I didn't have anything else to do, I
counted the snowflakes settling on the twigs and branch. Their number
was exactly 3,741,952. When the next snowflake dropped onto the branch -
nothing more than nothing, as you say - the branch broke off". Having
said that, the coal-mouse flew away.
The dove, since Noah's time an authority on the
matter, thought about the story for a while, and finally said to herself
"perhaps there is only one person's voice lacking for peace and
justice to come about in the world".
-
from The Never Ending by Grahame Russell
hi Kev...what a lovely story. And what a gentle and very Candian way to say enough is enough. That time is coming and it will happen...
ReplyDeleteHi Simon I thought about doing more with it but felt it was powerful enough on it's own. This story while indeed lovely truly speaks to a growing frustration of mine and that is the defeatism one encounters so much today.
ReplyDelete"I am only one person,what can I do"
Well as this story shows, together we are much too powerful a force to stop
Canada's lucky number is 3,741,953
ReplyDeleteGrand merci, Kevin.
ReplyDeleteIt can be understood in many ways, some negative (the straw that broke the camel's back) or as the dove saw it, the last minuscule contribution that tips the balance in favour of a collective movement for peace, or justice or ...
Very inspiring.