Includes bibliographical references (pages 401-407) and index.

1 Seeds of the Possible -- From The Cure at Troy / Seamus Heaney 16 -- 1 A Slender Thread / Diane Ackerman 22 -- 2 Ordinary Resurrections / Jonathan Kozol 30 -- 3 Standing Up for Children / Marian Wright Edelman 37 -- 4 Political Paralysis / Danusha Veronica Goska 47 -- 2 Dark Before the Dawn -- from September 1, 1939 / W. H. Auden 58 -- 5 Optimism of Uncertainty / Howard Zinn 63 -- 6 Dark Years / Nelson Mandela 73 -- 7 An Orientation of the Heart / Vaclav Havel 82 -- 3 Everyday Grace -- Peace of Wild Things / Wendell Berry 92 -- from Last Night As I Was Sleeping / Antonio Machado 93 -- 8 Mountain Music / Scott Russell Sanders 99 -- 9 Sukkah of Shalom / Arthur Waskow 106 -- 10 Getting Our Gaze Back / Rose Marie Berger 111 -- 11 Fragile and Hidden / Henri Nouwen 114 -- 12 There Is a Season / Parker Palmer 116 -- 4 Flight of Our Dreams -- Celebration of the Human Voice / Eduardo Galeano 126 -- 13 Childhood and Poetry / Pablo Neruda 132 -- 14 To Love the Marigold / Susan Griffin 134 -- 15 Walking with the Wind / John Lewis 141 -- 16 Freedom Songs / Rosemarie Freeney Harding 145 -- 17 Rough Translation / Toni Mirosevich 147 -- 18 Jesus and Alinsky / Walter Wink 149 -- 19 Stories from the Cha Cha Cha / Vern Huffman 161 -- 20 Do Not Go Gentle / Sherman Alexie 163 -- 21 Despair Is a Lie We Tell Ourselves / Tony Kushner 169 -- 5 Courage is Contagious -- To Be of Use / Marge Piercy 174 -- 22 Small Work in the Great Work / Victoria Safford 183 -- 23 In What Do I Place My Trust? / Rosalie Bertell 191 -- 24 Not Deterred / Paxus Calta-Star 196 -- 25 Rebellion Is What Built America / Jim Hightower 198 -- 26 Faith Works / Jim Wallis 203 -- 27 Composing a Life Story / Mary Catherine Bateson 207 -- 6 Global Stage -- Imagine the Angels of Bread / Martin Espada 218 -- 28 Come September / Arundhati Roy 230 -- 29 Black Hole / Ariel Dorfman 241 -- 30 Hope for Human Rights / Kenneth Roth 251 -- 31 Green Dream / Mark Hertsgaard 254 -- 32 Curitiba / Bill McKibben 264 -- 7 Radical Dignity -- from Natural Resources / Adrienne Rich 274 -- How Have You Spent Your Life? / Jalaluddin Rumi 275 -- 33 Letter from Birmingham Jail / Martin Luther King, Jr. 281 -- 34 Real Rosa Parks / Paul Rogat Loeb 288 -- 35 Prisoners of Hope / Cornel West 293 -- 36 Behemoth in a Bathrobe / Carla Seaquist 298 -- 37 Road to Redemption / Billy Wayne Sinclair 302 -- 38 Resisting Terror / Peter Ackerman, Jack DuVall 308 -- 8 Beyond Hope -- Origami Emotion / Elizabeth Barrette 320 -- from The New York Poem / Sam Hamill 321 -- 39 Staying the Course / Mary-Wynne Ashford 328 -- 40 Elm Dance / Joanna Macy 332 -- 41 Hoping Against Hope / Nadezhda Mandelstam 341 -- 42 Inevitability Trap / K. C. Golden 344 -- 43 You Have to Pick Your Team / Sonya Vetra Tinsley, Paul Rogat Loeb 346 -- 44 From Hope to Hopelessness / Margaret Wheatley 348 -- 9 Only Justice Can Stop a Curse -- Still I Rise / Maya Angelou 354 -- 45 Only Justice Can Stop a Curse / Alice Walker 361 -- 46 Clan of One-Breasted Women / Terry Tempest Williams 368 -- 47 Next Year in Mas'Ha / Starhawk 378 -- 48 Gruntwork of Peace / Amos Oz 383 -- 49 No Future Without Forgiveness / Desmond Tutu 390.