Compassion

[Guest guest]

(this is part 2 of a 7 part poem I wrote for 9/11)ii. If ever we have felt a bitter veil of tears running down the rivers of our face and remembered why we shed them, we would know compassion. If ever we have lain in bed, too sick or injured, without energy to lift even a finger in a curse or blessing, we would know compassion. If ever we have lost a Loved One, so dear to us for any of 10000 reasons, felt that bottomless hole, that absence of presence, we would know compassion. If ever a hand or word betrayed us with a bitter cup and scorpion sting, filled us with a blood-curdling scream of despair, forgetful of Love's faintest memory, we would know compassion. If ever we have loved a leafy plant, a sacred grove a rock of ages, the colours of sunrise, the embrace of velvet nights, the glance of eternity in a stormy sky, we would know compassion. If ever we have loved a man woman or child, a mother land an ideal that should never perish for which we would gladly give our lives, bewildered by the unrelenting grace of devotion and the all-consuming fire of love. we would know compassion, our birthright. See, it's all rather simple, really. The *other* is just *practicing* his/her*I am*, as I am.~A