About our ESL during the Pandemic, 3/14/20

Posted on ; Filed under News

Dear ESL students,
St. James wants to help slow the coronavirus pandemic. Because the City of Somerville has closed their offices, our schools, and libraries for two weeks, we are also closing our free ESL classes until further notice. We hope this will keep our friends and neighbors healthy and possibly help save lives.
 
Notice of when we will reopen will be posted here, at the private “ESL at St James Somerville” Facebook page, and/or at the St. James Facebook page (@StJSomervilleMA). Meanwhile, please feel free to call, email, or post your questions on Facebook. We can have conversations online! Perhaps we can talk about the poem posted below, or direct you to helpful resources. We are still here and want to help.
 
Stay healthy!
*********************
Pandemic
 
What if you thought of it
as the Jews consider the Sabbath—
the most sacred of times?
Cease from travel.
Cease from buying and selling.
Give up, just for now,
on trying to make the world
different than it is.
Sing. Pray. Touch only those
to whom you commit your life.
Center down.
And when your body has become still,
reach out with your heart.
Know that we are connected
in ways that are terrifying and beautiful.
(You could hardly deny it now.)
Know that our lives
are in one another’s hands.
(Surely, that has come clear.)
Do not reach out your hands.
Reach out your heart.
Reach out your words.
Reach out all the tendrils
of compassion that move, invisibly,
where we cannot touch.
Promise this world your love–
for better or for worse,
in sickness and in health,
so long as we all shall live.
–Lynn Ungar 3/11/20
 
http://www.lynnungar.com/poems/pandemic/?fbclid=IwAR0p2dsPQLVHii1HipQAZBoBgCBzL0rUZYiFfRZBkZEQ7Q_Q2GvGknciqEU
Image from
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Christ_Healing_the_Mother_of_Simon_Peter%E2%80%99s_Wife_by_John_Bridges.jpg