On Hate

And so
it has taken me
all of sixty years
to understand
that water is the finest drink,
and bread the most delicious food,
and that art is worthless
unless it plants
a measure of splendor in people's hearts.

After we die,
and the weary heart
has lowered it's final eyelid
on all that we have done,
and on all that we have longed for,
on all that we have dreamt of,
all we've desired
or felt,
hate will be
the first thing
to putrefy
within us.

Palestinian poet,
Taha Muhammad Ali