Seek Ye First

O bless this people, Lord, who seek their own face
under the mask and can hardly recognize it ...

O bless this people that breaks its bond ...

And with them, all the peoples of Europe,
All the peoples of Asia,
All the peoples of Africa,
All the peoples of America,
Who sweat blood and sufferings.

And see in the midst of these millions of waves,
The sea swell of the heads of my people.
And grand to their warm hands that they may clasp
The earth in a girdle of brotherly hands,
Beneath the rainbow of thy peace.

Words: by Leopold Sedar Senghor* in An African Prayer Book, Selections and with Introductions by Desmond Tutu.

*noted French poet and essayist, president of Senegal, West Africa, in the 1960s.

Image: "Seek Ye First the Kingdom of God," Found-Object Assemblage by Roberta Karstetter