Affirmation Poem by David Levitas

Through others' eyes we are reflected, our image confirmed,
Through forms, institutions and the paper chase we know what we have learned,
And by means of persons otherness we feel of what we've sighed
Of how the whips and rankles on our limbs tell us what was truth, what lies.
For in the speech of others eyes our bearing is made in verite,
The strength we guage, the mind made clear, the weakness all confound,
Of how the balance formed in pain and grief can bear us on the ground.