St Augustine People for Peace and Justice was formed six months before the illegal invasion of Iraq in October, 2002. Back in the day, we had hundreds at rallies and demonstrations. When I came to St Augustine 3 years ago, at the candlelight vigil in 2006, on the 3rd anniversary of this immoral and illegal invasion, we had 50 people. This year, March 19, 2009, we got 25 people to show up and about half were not even our members. We’re still around; we still demonstrate monthly. We still have death, destruction and despair. So what has happened? What has changed?
I started a garden this spring, determined to learn how to grow my own food. I needed a lot of help, did a lot of reading and talking to gardeners and it struck me how much a seed depends on so many factors to grow and thrive. Then I started thinking about the peace movement and wondering why IT isn’t growing and thriving.
HOW CAN THIS BE, when the steady drenching rain of tears forces our seed to germinate and break through the surface to grow towards the sun of truth and justice?
HOW CAN THIS BE, when the slow dripping irrigation of the blood of our kids and innocent Iraqis and Afghanis draws our roots down deeper and stronger into the soil of anger?
HOW CAN THIS BE, when the ravaged compost of dead children’s bodies enriches the ground of our rage?
HOW CAN THIS BE, when the winds of economic hurricane batter us and force us to strengthen both our roots and our resolve?
HOW CAN THIS BE, when the sunlight of the true human cost of these “wars” energizes us to grow new branches and produce ripe fruit full of new seeds?
HOW CAN THIS BE?
We are those seeds. We are and always have been the seeds of peace. We have everything we need to grow strong and propagate our message. This is our time; the ground is fertile with rage, death and despair. When spiny thorns and insidious roots of weeds of derision and dissent try to crowd out our vitality, we fight back and grow stronger. This is the ground where peacemakers grow. This is where we will prevail, propagate and bear the fruit of peace. This day, this hour, this minute is our season to plant and grow. We must not wilt, we must not wither, we must not succumb to the weeds of despair. This is a harvest we cannot afford to lose. Plant your roots deep in the soil of anger, spread your branches wide to the truth, throw your seeds onto the winds of the apathetic and the ignorant and multiply the message of peace a thousand times. We must spread the peace, one seed at a time. Only this harvest will save our world.

Mary Lawrence at the Florida March For Peace
Melbourne, FL - 03/19/09

I received a farewell email today from an Iraq war veteran, forty years my junior. I've only known him a little over a year. A year ago we were at a public event trying to explain to passers-by the horrible realities of our current wars/occupations. Someone asked me if we were brothers and he immediately responded that we were brothers-in arms. He is indeed more of a brother to me than those with whom I share parents.

He left college to “serve and protect” our country after 9/11 and eventually found himself a part of the assault on Fallujah. Upon his return home, he and his wife struggled to adjust to the realities he had experienced and reached out to other returning vets--even taking them into their own home. He was unable to return to college because his combat tour was a few days short of earning forgiveness of his student loans. As with many returning vets, he struggles with PTSD and discriminatory hiring practices. He and his wife have received death threats as a result of their activism. Last March he again answered the call to “serve and protect” and became one of the new generation of Winter Soldiers, a group of Iraq and Afghanistan combat veterans who publicly testified about the realities of the wars. He and his wife have selflessly given of themselves in the struggle to rebuild our community and our country. They are two of the many young people I have been privileged to meet in the past two years whose convictions and actions have been an inspiration to me.

I have known that he and many he served with were planning to leave this country if they did not see some movement in a positive direction by 2010. His email advised he had lost his job and sees no real hope here.

“...All is ruined and impure here, all of the good battles perhaps have been lost our water is dirty so is our air land is being chewed up and spit out by developers, and we are a bunch of warring idiots on a whole national scale devastating civilian populations all over the globe. I require freedom from this oppression. Capitalism is failing the whole while closing in around me. I will free myself and those willing to come with me can share this newfound freedom.

We should go, we have nothing to lose but our chains”

I will do what I can to keep him close. But in my heart I know he is right. I am too old and afraid to break my shackles and start over again with nothing. I will stay and do what I can to keep the machine from following and devouring our young. I am honored to know and learn from him and to be included in the invitation. To paraphrase an old song: “America, where are you now? Don't you care about our sons and daughters? Don't you know they need us now? They can't fight alone against the monster.”

I wish you well my brother. Stay safe and know that you and your wife are loved and treasured.

-- Terry Buckenmeyer

Spit flecked screaming and rabid believer eyes
Silence the thoughtful reasoned response.
Masses of marchers grim and sure
Trample the truth seekers’ faces in dirt.
Corporate gatekeepers defiant and arrogant
Paint a crap picture with cheap lazy brushes to
Obscure and repress the real and the true.

These Humpty Dumptys sit on a wall
While protesters everywhere wait for their fall
Huddled and helpless with voices so small
Just push their ass off and get on with it all.

-- Mary Lawrence

PPJ protest stones (and shells!) have been dropped in "appropriate" places since 2003.

In st. Augie, I reluctantly, tie a few red bows, on a door knob, on the dog, read the paper man in jail, for throwing a shoe, at a killer President, I read the paper. outraged citizen, complains we don't respect the "office of the president, my neighbor was evicted, signs on her house, belongings on the street, another neighbor, commits suicide, as his job is whisked away, but we get carried away as the pres. dodges the shoe....dodges the bullet.