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Apologies

Author(s):
Maia Wolff Ostrom
Issue:
On Prayer (March 2024)
Department:
Letters

Dear Friends: Sometimes our ears are closed, our hands are over our ears, and we are singing at the top of our lungs, the lyrics, “No no no, I’m right, I’m hurt.”

And in this state, we are not able to hear an apology.

From the other side, hearing this kind of song, wanting to restore connection, we can do this: Speak our apologies into the song, and hope (even if it seems futile) to be heard. Send out our love, even when it’s not received . . . not this time.

As singers, eventually, we might become tired of singing. Our bones will remember. They felt the reverberations. Perhaps we will sit in silence and deeply listen, remembering words spoken into our song. Perhaps this is years later. And we will finally open and hear.

– Maia Wolff, Agate Passage Friends Meeting (NPYM)

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