When Guns Went Silent

2. Unofficial friendliness across battle lines that makes propaganda blush and commanders nervous.
4. The authority to punish, paused; the calculus revised to include the heart.
7. The surplus of kindness that makes negotiations glide instead of grind.
8. A negotiated halt that prepares the room for deeper talks, like setting the table before difficult dinner conversation.
9. Steps taken to soften conflict without pretending differences have vanished.
10. A cooling of tensions measurable not in poetry but in fewer jets in the sky and fewer hands on triggers.
12. The slow craft of stitching relationships until they can bear ordinary disagreements again.
14. The decision to carry weight together so no one’s knees buckle alone.
17. The careful choreography of former enemies inching back toward workable normal.
18. A formal order to stop shooting, sometimes fragile, sometimes durable enough to feel like a bridge being tested plank by plank.
19. A rest that doesn’t fix everything but makes fixing possible.

1. Guided conversation with a referee who keeps the ball on the field and the elbows down.
2. Strength that chooses restraint, the muscle that keeps the door from slamming.
3. Standing aside from a fight to keep trust available for errands like truth and aid.
5. The stubborn belief that human need outranks flags and slogans.
6. A mutually agreed pause in hostilities that lets tempers cool and priorities—like food, funerals, or fuel—take the front seat.
11. An official forgetting that allows civic life to resume its errands.
13. A protected passage through danger, the hallway where ambulances and strollers are the VIPs.
15. An interval when the noise forgets itself and you can hear a kettle or a bird.
16. A temporary relief, the breath you take before diving back into cold water.