i've changed.

i'm sorry.

knsayres.wordpress.com

im exhausted. the images remain in the camera.
its one of those moments where i need to process the world, before i process those images.
im afraid. im fairly sure that i failed as a journalist on this occasion: i didn’t ask the questions, didn’t get the difficult images. but sometimes you just have to be human.

there is chance’. she is seven years old—tall, with a tiny scar under her left eye. i have no idea what kinds of horror shes seen. a child of the war in the congo. an orphan. raped, abandoned.

fourteen children are sitting in the small sitting room, watching a film. she’s sitting in the corner, head in her hands. she wont answer questions. she wont look up.

but she doesn’t fight when i pick her up, put her in my lap. she curls up against me, and reaches for my hand. and she holds it tightly.

i know that ill never understand these stories. never be able to show the beauty of these children in photographs. ill never do truth justice. but isn'nt it more to love? i want to learn to love.

sanyati, zimbabwe

sanyati baptist hospital continues to serve hundreds of patients each day, even with chronic shortages of water, electricity and essential medicine. with the economic crisis in zimbabwe, the bush hospital lacks even basic supplies like mattresses and ceilings.

the week i was there, a shipment of medicines from baptist global response arrived. these medicines have allowed the hospital to continue treating patients, even when the rest of the country has shut down.

baptist global response hopes to complete a renovation of the facility in the near future.

a woman with a broke hip lies near her open bible in the inpatient ward of the hospital.

the hospital chaplain prays with a patient.

the children's ward quickly became my favorite place at sanyati. here are three of my closest friends there: benhilda, basil, and the baby.

a mother comforts her young son who is unable to move from his bed.

a man gets his vitals checked before he sees the doctor. one doctor provides care for hundreds of clinic patients each day, as well inpatient care.

(i dont have my notebook. i'll (maybe) update the captions with names later.)

(a beautiful poem, from a true and beautiful friend)

instructions upon entering darkness

You must hibernate:

Gather food,

Hold your rosary,

Hope (try to).

Always surround yourself with books,

not to read (necessarily)

But to remind yourself that some things

do last

and new stories are retold.

Transformation with time.

Don't talk too much,

Lips need slumber too.

Learn to listen,

Ears need constant vigilance.

Pray,

Only then will you know inherent value.

Drink wine with friends who don't

rush your pain.

Believe that humility rarely shows

up without humiliation.

Turn your face to the sky:

The earth will continue to rotate around an axis

toward the sun's rays.

Winter is coming,

Spring will come after.

The deep sleep will be aroused...

It will.

A frozen river still rushes water deep within.

And when the ice does thaw,

don't forget.

The sea was parted, the walls were tumbled,

the way was prepared.

Remember--for this will come again--

Just as the leaves fall, fertilize and recloak

the oaks of righteousness.

rebecca mcneil smith

a poem i love. which, i think, could also be appropriately titled, how to be alive.

How To Be a Poet

by Wendell Berry

(to remind myself)

i

Make a place to sit down.

Sit down. Be quiet.

You must depend upon

affection, reading, knowledge,

skill—more of each

than you have—inspiration,

work, growing older, patience,

for patience joins time

to eternity. Any readers

who like your poems,

doubt their judgment.

ii

Breathe with unconditional breath

the unconditioned air.

Shun electric wire.

Communicate slowly. Live

a three-dimensioned life;

stay away from screens.

Stay away from anything

that obscures the place it is in.

There are no unsacred places;

there are only sacred places

and desecrated places.

iii

Accept what comes from silence.

Make the best you can of it.

Of the little words that come

out of the silence, like prayers

prayed back to the one who prays,

make a poem that does not disturb

the silence from which it came.

more photos of the street boys in nairobi.

You who are God’s servants are living in a foreign country, for your own city-state is far away from this city-state. Knowing which is yours, why do you acquire fields, costly furnishings, buildings, and frail dwellings here? Anyone who acquired things for himself in this city cannot expect to find the way home to his own City. Do you not realize that all these things here do not belong to you, that they are under a power alien to your nature? The ruler will say you do not obey my laws, either observe my laws or get out of my country, Take care lest it prove fatal to you to repudiate your own laws. Acquire no more here than what is absolutely necessary. Instead of fields, buy for yourselves people in distress in accordance with your means.

-Hermas, 140 AD