The Chinese philosopher Confucius said, “Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it.”
I often think about the eyes of Van Gogh. Eyes that in the midst of suffering, saw such wondrous beauty. Who saw and painted the awe of the stars, of fields, of sunflowers, of the poetry of the commonplace. As he wrote to his brother, Theo, “What am I in the eyes of most people - a nonentity, an eccentric, or an unpleasant person - somebody who has no position in society and will never have; in short, the lowest of the low. All right then - even if that were absolutely true, then I should one day like to show by my work what such an eccentric, such a nobody has in his heart. That is my ambition, based less on resentment than on love in spite of everything, based more on a feeling of serenity than on passion. Though I am often in the depths of misery, there is still calmness, pure harmony and music inside me. I see paintings or drawings in the poorest cottages, in the dirtiest corners. And my mind is driven towards these things with irresistible momentum.”
How many of us see beauty, see art in the poor? How many of us even truly see the poor? For most, the homeless are simply a part of the landscape or they are something to hope that the stoplight will turn green so that we don’t have to look at them. Years ago, I befriended a homeless man named Rich. He liked to joke about being a poor man named Rich. The first time I struck up a conversation with him, he was shocked. At one point during our chatting, he said words that shot straight, deep into my spirit, “You are the first person to see me - actually see me. You see me as a person and no a problem.”
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