Silence of the Wind

We pulled the car over alongside a vast field of green growing wheat and sat pondering the silence of the wind – it is an ill wind that blows today up the Kings Highway to the ancient plains of Moab. I watched a small bird of prey hovering quite still high above the ground for a full ten minutes before it plunged to earth feasting on insects recently unearthed by the plough. Then watched the antics of the Hoopoe bird as it chased its mate in-between the sheaths of wheat a stone's throw from the car. It was silence of a sad kind. Our favourite aunt lay dying of cancer in a hospital bed surrounded by family and friends as the priest gave the last rites.
And then it was over.
And as I looked across the field at the tiny hamlet of houses, at the shepherd and his flock of sheep, I mourned not just for Leila, but for all those suffering death and despair throughout the Middle East today. I mourned for all those clinging to their culture by their fingertips as the ill conceived winds of change are imposed from afar by military might, deception and self interest.

And now the Dead Sea and the Jordan River are dying…..

J