The Same Inside

Walking to your place for a love feast
I saw at a street corner
an old beggar woman.

I took her hand,
kissed her delicate cheek,
we talked, she was
the same inside as I am,
from the same kind,
I sensed this instantly
as a dog knows by scent
another dog.

I gave her money,
I could not part from her.
After all, one needs
someone who is close.

And then I no longer knew
why I was walking to your place.

Anna Swir 1909 – 1984. Her poetry is known for its warmth and intensity, and pity for suffering people.

***

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing,
There is a field. I’ll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in that grass,
the world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase each other
Doesn’t make any sense.

Jelalluddin Rumi 1207 – 1273. World famous Persian poet and mystic.

We are all the same inside as Swir says. To meet each other no words are necessary Rumi adds. This has been brought forcibly to my mind recently as I watched the great migration of Syrian refugees. How desperate, how heart-breaking – beyond politics and borders. I listen to the rhetoric of both sides of the political currency.  I don’t have any solutions or advice. And yet … we are passengers on the same ship.