Human Family

I have always felt that we seem to get caught up in all the differences. Somehow we are taught from childhood how different everyone and everything is. Strange but true that this is the cause of all the distress that we find around us. I don’t ever remember of being taught of the similarities.

All we are reminded constantly is of how diverse and varied each and everything is. We focus on the differences in the animals. We speak about the variety of flowers, fruits, seasons and name it, we know of all the differences.

Yet oddly we too teach our children the same things. We teach them how different every person is. We teach them about the different colors of skin and the disparity of the different races and nations.

It can go on and on, yet when will we be able to stop for a moment and say, I am able to see the oneness in all these differences? I can truly see the same chord running through the various people of the world. We as a human race share the same hopes and destiny. And to be able to say that I am truly glad that we belong to the same human race!

I read this simple yet thought provoking poem by Maya Angelou, where she speaks about the human family.

Maya Angelou

I note the obvious differences

in the human family.

Some of us are serious,

some thrive on comedy.

Some declare their lives are lived

as true profundity,

and others claim they really live

the real reality.

The variety of our skin tones

can confuse, bemuse, delight,

brown and pink and beige and purple,

tan and blue and white.

I've sailed upon the seven seas

and stopped in every land,

I've seen the wonders of the world

not yet one common man.

I know ten thousand women

called Jane and Mary Jane,

but I've not seen any two

who really were the same.

Mirror twins are different

although their features jibe,

and lovers think quite different thoughts

while lying side by side.

We love and lose in China,

we weep on England's moors,

and laugh and moan in Guinea,

and thrive on Spanish shores.

We seek success in Finland,

are born and die in Maine.

In minor ways we differ,

in major we're the same.

I note the obvious differences

between each sort and type,

but we are more alike, my friends,

than we are unalike.

We are more alike, my friends,

than we are unalike.

We are more alike, my friends,

than we are unalike.