<html><head></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 14px;"><i>Biniam Habte, a 20-year-old Eritrean, who had crossed the Sahara in his quest to reach Europe, told a British newspaper reporter in Calais: “On the journey I have made, you carry your life like an egg in your hand.”</i></span></div><div><br></div><div>Carry Your Life</div><div><br></div><div>What does it mean to carry your life</div><div>A thing so fragile, so vital</div><div>It might burst from your careful</div><div>Ministrations and escape to an</div><div>Unseen fate?</div><div><br></div><div>Do we know that we </div><div>Carry our lives or must</div><div>Our existence be threatened </div><div>For us to awaken to our</div><div>Precious, quixotic nature?</div><div><br></div><div>A gift, this animated body</div><div>Everyday it does the soul's</div><div>Labor, the heart's will,</div><div>Stirred by a curious</div><div>Mind—active and demanding.</div><div><br></div><div>Within the body's kind surrender,</div><div>We labor, live our illusions</div><div>Ask for more, insist.</div><div>Unaware or unwilling, we ignore</div><div>The delicate light we carry inside.</div><div><br></div><div>And in our ignorance,</div><div>A hardening begins—</div><div>Against our own vulnerability </div><div>The vulnerability of all our</div><div>Kind. Together we awaken</div><div><br></div><div>See ourselves in others, ask how</div><div>Do we carry the defenseless eggs</div><div>Of others as they cross</div><div>Our lives? How will we allow</div><div>Ourselves to be carried?</div><div><br></div><div><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"> </span>- Rebecca del Rio</div></body></html>