To help us see each other in a new way/

May we hold hands and think again another day/

Looking into each others eyes as we say/

A welcoming and heartfelt, hey~

This past week at the United Nations, many discussions regarding the topic of disabilities were held by various countries and supported by multiple and diverse organizations. I attended 2 of the meetings. One was on the topic of North-South Korea relations and how it relates to the Paralympics. Representatives of South and North Korea were present as were people who had personally participated in the Paralympics. All perspectives related to each other on the point that the Paralympics provided North and South Korea with the opportunity to cooperate and show a renewed sense of hope to the world of a positive relationship. 

This is interesting in the sense that such harmony can also be found in poetry. As mentioned in an earlier blog post of mine regarding children and poetry, poems connote a sense of emotional unity to those who read as well as those who hear its lines. In a similar manner, poetry can help people understand one another in a more sincere manner. Instead of posing, as say a standard document would, certain criteria that must be met; or even as prose would lay out structured content with  definitive points, poetry is more dynamic and offers the information in a more emotional, yet also more soul-touching,  in-depth manner. This relates to an experience I had in the second meeting I went to.

The second meeting I went to was about stigma and disability, with a primary focus on leprosy. During the event, a gentleman from Nepal, who has suffered from leprosy, offered his personal experience with the issue. In his memoir-like recounting of events, he said that he was often shunned away from school and felt the need to stay within his room so not to bother anyone and so that he would not face any more ridicule than he already had. He went on to state how the stigma surrounding leprosy in Nepal is so widespread and vicious that he was not allowed to enter into marriage with his fiancee because of Nepalese law. Admittedly. the Nepalese gentleman did not begin speaking in verse. Poetics does not necessarily entail that one must speak in verse in order for the poetic spirit to be conveyed. The Nepalese gentleman's words were spoken with a smooth cadence and solemn rhythm which conveyed the gravity of his experiences with the stigma surrounding leprosy. Despite its formality, there was a slight but apparent applause that circled around the room after he concluded the telling of his experience. 

Moments such as those I recounted above, are what makes the United Nations a spectacular international, intergovernmental organization to be able to be connected with. Though there are many meetings that are purely comprised of statistics and knowledge which is often stored in esoteric, academic journals not open to the public; there are also instances where they invite people who have experienced such distress in actuality to share their personal struggles and how they faced the issues facing the global community. Though it is true that we all face the outcomes of societal issues and problems, there are those who come face to face with it prior to its spreading throughout the world. Being able to hear experiences from such people, offers a perspective that is often rare to many ears of those in developed countries. One of honesty, truth, and genuine humility in the face of disastrous, horrific, and oftentimes unbelievable atrocities.

May poetry guide the way/

To help us see each other in a new way/

May we hold hands and think again another day/

Looking into each others eyes as we say/

A welcoming and heartfelt, hey~