When this is over,
may we never again
take for granted
A handshake with a stranger
Full shelves at the store
Conversations with neighbors
A crowded theatre
Friday night out
The taste of communion
A routine checkup
The school rush each morning
Coffee with a friend
The stadium roaring
Each deep breath
A boring Tuesday
Life itself.
When this ends,
may we find
that we have become
more like the people
we wanted to be
and may we stay
that way – better
for each other
because of the worst.
By Laura Kelly Fanucci
DON’T LET PEOPLE TALK YOU OUT OF WHAT JESUS HAS TALKED YOU INTO!
My Commentary:
This poem was born in a season when the world grew quiet — eerily quiet. Streets emptied. Sanctuaries closed. Ballparks went silent. We discovered, almost overnight, how much of life we had been living without noticing it.
At the height of Covid-19, ordinary things became sacred. A handshake was no longer casual; it was courageous. Grocery shelves were no longer background scenery; they were reassurance. A crowded theater, once taken for granted, became a symbol of shared humanity. Even a “boring Tuesday” revealed itself as a gift. When routines disappeared, we realized that routines were anchors. When breath was threatened, breath became holy.
The line “Each deep breath” may be the most haunting of all. A virus that attacked the lungs forced us to recognize what we rarely honor — that every breath is grace. We learned that life is not guaranteed in grand moments alone, but in the quiet, repetitive mercies of the everyday.
And yet the poem does more than mourn what was lost. It hopes. It prays that suffering might shape us. That isolation might deepen compassion. That fear might refine gratitude. It asks whether the worst of times could draw out our best selves.
“May we find that we have become more like the people we wanted to be.” That is the moral turning point. Crisis exposes character. But it can also form it. We saw neighbors delivering groceries. Nurses working beyond exhaustion. Teachers reinventing classrooms. Families rediscovering dinner tables. We glimpsed who we could be.
The final prayer is not merely that the pandemic would end, but that its lessons would endure — that gratitude would outlast fear, and kindness would outlive crisis.
Because the real tragedy would not be what we lost
It would be forgetting what we learned.
We learned during Covid-19 that life is not guaranteed in grand moments alone, but in the quiet, repetitive mercies of the everyday. Have YOU forgotten this?
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Have a Blessed Wednesday!
