Rohingyas - Humanity First ! Poem by Bernedita Rosinha Pinto

How much will the gentleness of faith weigh upon their shoulders
when their own homes, their own land they have to leave and flee
to save themselves and their kin from others who rise up
against their faith by those whose faith preaches of love
and tolerance in consistence of existence?
How far will those mothers with their little children run?
How fast will the young, the old trudge on to find refuge
when every road they walk, every street they stand,
makes everyone look at them with suspicion, with unwillingness
to shelter or feed them, to grant them any refuge?
Why is the scale of humanity which holds respect for life
tilting upwards restricting those who must provide shelter
unto those who on their feet have walked many miles
in anticipation of safety and shelter?
who can they depend on to provide them with assistance
if not for the nations around them,
if not the neighbours around them?
As many in number, many in extremity of poverty cluster
awaiting for food, for a roof, for a place to hold on.
And by power of providence, by power of care and concern
humanity alone can extend its helping hands to receive those
who have come to discard their yesterday from fear and terror?
if religions can make men enemies of one another
if religion can make men flee from his own native
which eyelids can refuse to perceive the unworthiness it causes?
Let every nation thus unite and give back the religious freedom
to those who seek to live and abide by their own faith;
let every faithful rejoice in his freedom to practice his own religion
in his own way of worship, in his own attic and attire
with their own voice, by their own faith in their own podium;
O' humanity, give them a glass of water to drink and to enable them
to call out to their God in togetherness of prayers and peacefulness.