Align with Truth and Beauty

Profile in courage. An unarmed woman facing down police with riot gear last spring in New Orleans.

 The 2008 financial collapse was one in a line of institutional failures that hurt a lot of people: intelligence (9/11), governmental and military (the Iraq War and all its fallout), religious (the Catholic Church's sex abuse scandal), and the ongoing failures of the business (offshoring jobs to increase profits), educational (the rise of charter schools and the hollowing of funding for public schools) and public safety systems (police shootings of unarmed citizens).

All along our public safety system was arming itself, as though they were at war with their own people, especially against communities of color. Gun rights have been elevated above and beyond common sense, resulting in many mass shootings, and causing people to feel unsafe everywhere they go.

It's small wonder a candidate like Trump appealed to as many people as he did. He pointed out how the system was broken and who was to blame in ways that resonated with 46.3 percent of voters. That he was vague on details troubled people less than they felt a presidential candidate finally understood them. He also led them to believe he was smart enough and strong enough and resourceful enough to solve their problems.

It was evident to me and 53.7 percent of voters that Trump's main objective was to glorify himself and to enrich himself and other wealthy people at taxpayer expense, while making most peoples' lives worse rather than better.

But I'm not here to rehash Trump's perfidy. I'm here to share the balm and refuge I and and others are creating to see us through what appears to be dangerous times under dangerous leadership.

Many artists work outside institutions to create works that envision, comfort, challenge and inspire. I have long gravitated toward books, music and people to align me with truth and beauty.

So this happened over the weekend:

Patti Smith, who deserves if not a Nobel then all kinds of prizes for her musical and literary works, performed "A Hard Rain Gonna Fall" in laureate Bob Dylan's place. The song is a 20th-century perspective of human history. Please take the nine minutes to watch her. Her performance puts a mirror before us. What we see is not always pretty, but it also reflects  beauty. At one point she forgets the words, smiling and telling the audience, "Sorry, I'm so nervous." She is real in every way a person can be, and the audience applauds her for it as well as performing such a tour de force in such a human way.

Another rock icon, Neil Young, said in an interview in Mother Jones that this time reminds him of the 60s, and reassures us we'll make through this, too.

I find comfort in poetry and nature. Here's Hurricane, a poem from Mary Oliver. She shows us we can brace ourselves even in the wildest storm.