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Several years ago I listened to Requiem: The Story of One Sky by Dimash Qudaibergen, an internationally acclaimed singer from Kazakhstan whose music often explores themes of peace, compassion, and our shared humanity. The song is a plea for peace in a world too often divided by conflict. (I encourage you to listen to it on YouTube.) At the conclusion of the song appeared a quote from Pope Francis:
“Dialogue, understanding and the widespread promotion of a culture of tolerance, acceptance of others and of living together peacefully would contribute significantly to reducing many economic, social, political and environmental problems that weigh so heavily on a large part of humanity.”
The words lingered long after the music ended.
As I reflected on them, I found myself thinking about war, not from the perspective of governments or military leaders, but through the eyes of ordinary families. Those thoughts eventually led me to write a poem called Four Walls.
In the poem I imagined a father walking hand in hand with his young child. The route was familiar. Past the corner coffee shop where neighbors exchanged greetings each morning. Past the bakery where fresh bread emerged from the ovens before sunrise.
Past the small businesses that gave life to the community and livelihoods to the people who lived there. To the child, it was simply home. A place of comfort and routine. A place where tomorrow would look much like today.
Within the four walls of their home there was laughter. Family meals around the kitchen table. Bedtime stories. Dreams about the future. The simple moments that often go unnoticed because we assume they will always be there. Outside those walls, an economy quietly supported everyday life. There was a sense of stability, however modest, that allowed families to plan for a better future.
Then war arrived.
The transformation was swift. The coffee shop closed. The bakery’s windows shattered. The familiar streets became unrecognizable. Businesses that had taken decades to build disappeared in a matter of days. Jobs vanished. Savings lost their value. Supply chains broke down. Food and clean water became scarce. Homes were abandoned. The economic foundation that supported the community collapsed beneath the weight of conflict.
Yet the greatest losses could never be measured in dollars or rebuilt with time. Young children, through eyes that should know only innocence, witnessed scenes their minds were never meant to process. Families were separated. Parents searched desperately for missing children. Children searched desperately for missing parents. The routines that once defined daily life were replaced by uncertainty, fear, and grief.
The image that remained with me was that of a child with tears flowing and bloodshot eyes. His father taken by the ravages of war. The four walls that once provided safety and security now reduced to rubble.
A family torn apart.
When we discuss the cost of war, we often focus on military spending, destroyed infrastructure, and economic damage. Those losses are real. Entire generations can spend decades rebuilding what conflict destroys in months.
But the deepest wounds are often invisible. The true cost is measured in broken families, lost futures, shattered communities, and the quiet security that so many of us take for granted. And all because understanding gave way to hatred, and dialogue gave way to violence.
The older I get, the more I believe that most people want remarkably similar things. A safe home. Meaningful work. Food on the table. The opportunity to raise their children in peace. These hopes transcend borders, languages, religions, and politics.
Perhaps that is why the words of Pope Francis stayed with me. And perhaps that is why the image of those four walls continues to resonate.
The title, The Story of One Sky, stayed with me.
The father and child in my poem. The baker opening his shop before dawn. The coffee shop owner greeting customers each morning. The families caught in the middle of conflict. Different lives, different circumstances, yet all sharing the same hopes for safety, security, and peace.
Near the end of the song comes a simple message: “We are choosing life.”
I have often reflected on those words. War asks us to focus on what divides us. The song asks us to remember what unites us.
Beyond our differences, most of us are simply trying to protect the people we love and build a better future for those who follow us. Perhaps peace begins when we recognize that simple truth. Because behind every conflict are ordinary people who simply wish to live their lives beneath one sky.
They are choosing life.
For those that would like to listen to the song on YouTube.
https://youtu.be/1Psjws97FoA?is=mI0yZ0sAmmNjjLEf
Hi Andrew, thank you for that moving and provocative post. So provocative, I went looking for a link to your poem, but did not find one. SO I checked on-line and found a few poems with the same name, but not yours. Would you be able to share a link or the poem itself, to accompany your moving post? Thanks for your many contributions to Humble Dollar!
Thank you so much for your kind words. I’m truly touched that the article resonated with you. The poem has never been published, so I’m not surprised you couldn’t find it online. I’m delighted to share it with you, and I hope it adds another dimension to the thoughts behind the article. Thank you again for your thoughtful comment and for your continued encouragement, it means a great deal to me.
And go to YouTube to check Dimash Requiem of One Sky.
Four Walls
The father takes his child’s hand,
Their fingers intertwined as one.
Providing a sense of security and love,
As they navigate a troubled land.
A child’s life full of innocence,
In a world yet to reveal itself.
To young eyes yet to explore,
The realities of life.
Within the four walls love flourishes,
The outside world a different story.
Where tolerance is not accepted,
With war and hate the deadly choice.
The bloodshot eyes of the child,
His father taken by the ravages of war.
The four walls collapsing,
A family torn apart.
To imagine a life of peace and harmony,
With minds open to one another.
Where we can all live as one,
Outside the strength
of our own four walls.
Wow, just wow!
Thank you David, a double wow!
Thank you, Andrew, for another thoughtful reflection and an enlightening comment from Mark. Your post brought me back to the movie La Vie est Belle, misunderstood by some, but in my opinion a beautiful depiction of how a father tried to give hope to his little boy, even while marching to his own death at the concentration camp where they were both imprisoned during the Holocaust.
Thank you Linda. That’s a beautiful connection. La Vie est Belle captured something deeply moving, the extraordinary lengths a parent will go to preserve a child’s hope and innocence, even in the darkest of circumstances. In many ways, that same image of a father trying to protect his child was at the heart of what inspired Four Walls. Thank you for sharing that.
Albert Einstein said, “Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding.”
Sadly, human beings have been warring on each other for thousands of years, and it’s not going to stop. I believe we are simply not motivated by our nature to understand each other.
Thank you Mike. I think Einstein captured something profound. While I don’t believe conflict will ever disappear completely, I do think we have a choice in how we respond to those who are different from us.
My hope in writing the article was simply to encourage a little more understanding and empathy. We may not be able to change the world, but we can certainly influence the small corner of it that we each occupy.
That’s a great philosophy, Andrew.
Thank you Dan. I believe it’s a philosophy that reminds us of what we have in common rather than what divides us.
Andrew, your article took me straight back to my childhood and early adulthood. I’ll keep this as brief as I can.
My earliest crystal-clear memory is of trauma. Specifically, an event known as the Battle of Lenadoon — a four-day running gun battle between military and paramilitary forces. I was out walking with my dad when a masked gunman pressed a weapon to his head. I remember screaming and kicking the man, and his colleague pistol-whipped me — gently, relatively speaking — before warning my father to leave the area or face the consequences. What followed was three days hiding in my bedroom while the fighting raged outside, then fleeing to a cottage in the countryside for the summer, then coming home to a different house in a different town with a different school.
That was the first of many. A 1,000lb bomb detonating thirty minutes after my mum dropped me at school, and the tears I cried convinced she was dead. Being blown down the main street during another incident, covered in broken glass and blood. There’s much, much more, but I’ll leave it there — because what I really want to share is something more hopeful.
Here is what my own experience, and watching my childhood friends, has taught me: children are resilient and emotionally flexible beyond anything you could imagine. Violence becomes normalised within the world a young mind inhabits. Armoured vehicles on the streets became as familiar as buses; we knew their makes and markings, understood the tactics — fire and manoeuvre, bounding overwatch — of the soldiers advancing down our road, and then went inside and imitated them in play. You live inside your own bubble of childhood make-believe, and most of the storm passes you by.
Hold onto that when you worry about children in conflict zones. It’s a small piece of hope, but it’s real.
Thank you Mark for sharing that. Reading your experiences was both heartbreaking and inspiring. No child should have to endure what you described, yet your comments about resilience gave me something to think about.
I suspect many of us who haven’t lived through conflict assume that children are forever defined by those experiences. Your story reminds us that while the scars may remain, children also possess an extraordinary ability to adapt, persevere, and find moments of normalcy amid chaos.
Thank you for sharing a perspective that few of us could offer firsthand.
Thank you for writing this. Bob
Thank you Bob for taking the time to read it, I appreciate it.
The qoute by Pope Francis simply and elegantly voices the needs and desires of most of the planet.
Thank you Terry . I couldn’t agree more. Its simplicity is what makes it so powerful. It speaks to hopes and aspirations that transcend borders, cultures, and politics.
Such wise and sentient refections, Andrew.
Sadly, I’m afraid that “trying to protect the people we love and build a better future for those who follow us” is often the reason given for waging war.
Thank you for reading my article. I think that’s a fair observation. Many wars are indeed justified as protecting people or securing a better future. My focus was less on the justification and more on the consequences, particularly for the ordinary families whose lives are forever changed by the conflict.