More Than They Can Be | theWAY Media

Cambodia. Pol Pot and Mao. They killed millions

Ravished the women. And the land

A decade… of atrocities… against humankind

After liberation… by Vietnam… the soldiers… became monks

The women… cannot

Because they are… less

Not worthy… of grace

An old woman… at the market

We had… no language

But could see… one another

And what I saw there…

…broke my soul

Helping me… to understand

Helping me… to also… be

The way she holds her head —

Not broken, not bowed… but something else

Something… I have no word for

She was fifteen… when they came

Eighteen… when her mother died

Twenty-one… when the fields finally… released their dead

Now her age… is sixty

And she smiles… at me… across the market

And her eyes… say…

Everything…

…and nothing

I want to look away… from what her eyes have seen…

But she won’t let me… she holds my gaze

Fierce, maybe

Gentle, yes

Alive… so very much

This is not resilience… not even strength!

This is something… the monks have no word for!

The scholars… cannot categorize!

The psychologists… would pathologize!

This… is divine spirit

Surviving… genocide

In the body…

Of a woman…

They say…

Is spiritually…

Less

And now… she serves the monks… at the pagoda

Yet she’s so much more

So much more

Oh…

So much more… than they can be

Thank you, Mother…

For holding my gaze

For holding space…

For one… as unworthy… as I