Who hears the verses of unsung poets in foreign lands?,
Whose voices are quelled by neglect or brutal hands,
Whose message in Europe that we rarely do hear,
Because of the distance and, perhaps, unspoken fears.

Who hears the words of those who really feel and truly know?
The pain and emotion that television documentaries can’t always show.
The stories of the farmers who alongside daily mortar’s a simple living try to maintain and keep;
a small holding, a small market stall, and perhaps a few aged sheep.

Who tells the tales of those women who bear the real cost?
And the burden of a husband, or son, to this terrible war that they’ve lost?
Of the days that they’ll now spend living isolated and alone,
Hiding from insurgents and foreign soldiers, in bomb damaged homes.

So how can we hear what these foreign voices need to say?
When we live in a country that seems so far away,
When we appear to be separated by language, culture, and creed,
How do we listen to another’s real needs?

By opening the doors to our hearts, and our minds,
By showing the compassion that binds of all mankind,
By applying the art of storytelling not used since biblical times,
By listening for the message that in each sentence we’ll find.

So let’s try to capture their stories in simple poetry, song, and in verse,
To hear the pure emotion neither scripted, censored, nor rehearsed,
To celebrate a people’s who lives are diverse and quite unique,
To capture their stories in a form that we may permanently keep.

So let’s begin a journey into another’s culture and strange land,
And prevent their life’s story disappearing like rain on hot sands.