“I keep thinking we need a new language – a language of the heart; some kind of new language between people that is a new kind of poetry. It’s the poetry of the dancing bee that tells us where the honey is.
I think to create that language, we’re going to have to learn how you could go through a looking glass into another kind of perception where you have that sense of being united to all things, and suddenly you understand everything.”

Andre in the movie: My Dinner With Andre

This reminds me a lot of what Thich Nhat Hanh (Thay) taught in a retreat I attended last year. Peace and love aren’t about mastering communication techniques – they begin with compassion and interbeing. When we start with the deep understanding that we are inextricably linked, that we’re all in this together and even my breathing out affects your breathing in, then things start to fall into place.

I like this image in My Dinner With Andre of the dancing bees. I remember an article in Scientific American a long time ago that showed the dances the bees do to tell the other bees where to find honey. There was a sort of dosi-do to point out pansies and a little hoochi-coo to map the marigolds. It was described as a dance because it was about movement, not sounds like humans try to communicate.

Taking it a step further, though, and thinking of this dance like poetry, and aspiring to have each step we take in our lives as a poetic dance expression, well, that’s an exciting thought. Ah-one, and ah-two, and ah-three we go…