Kindness

In the March 12th, Sunday, mailbox. . .

Poet Naomi Shihab Nye was born on this day in 1952 St. Louis, Missouri; its also the 101st anniversary of Jack Kerouac's birth in 1922 Lowell, Massachusetts.

There is a place to stand
where you can see so many lights
you forget you are one of them

— Naomi Shihab Nye, from Spruce Tree, Berkeley, Yellow Glove. Far Corner Books, 1986.

. . . it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to gaze at 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.

— Naomi Shihab Nye, from Kindness, Words Under the Words, The Eighth Mountain Press; 1st edition 1994.