to exist.

If you haven’t carried a baby that knows not to cry
Because no one has ever been around to soothe its tears
If you haven’t watched tears flow down the cheek of a girl
Who watched her mother burn to death
If you haven’t seen houses crumble and people scatter
If you haven’t taken the last train home at a time
When the last of the human clan are famished for rest
If you haven’t slept on bunk beds and metal floors
walked hungry long enough to not
hesitate to share a strangers food
If you haven’t met enough people to know that
Humanity does not metamorphose
By the color of the skin
Or the height of their homes
That leaders and beggars all cry the same tears
Out of the same broken hearts
If you haven’t conversed with the blind man and the deaf girl
Long enough to know
You’re no better
And that all we humans can do
is to give and give each other
Then my darling
You’ve seen too little
Too little of the world
To say you exist.