Agreed! A little break from all the hatred in the world. Lovely. Thanks, AZ. However, I am always touched and amazed at how much goodness there is out there. Over the years, people have helped me out in all kinds of situations--have really put themselves out--and I've seen this happen to others too. What's interesting to me is, why does this always feel surprising?! Well, perhaps because the hatred and violence seems so pervasive sometimes, it really gets one down.
I was also interested in Michael's question: how does one put this into poetry? I wonder... Straightforward narrative in a poem is refreshing too, but yes, there needs to be some new take on the matter.
Just out of curiosity I looked on the web and came up with this poem by Naomi Shihab Nye (below). Some might think it sappy, but she does make a point about kindness without being too gushy. Does anyone else know any kindness poems?
Kindness
Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.
Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and
purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
it is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.
OK, so there you are!
Charlotte
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