you and i

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The night knows nothing of the chants of night.
It is what it is as I am what I am:
And in perceiving this I best perceive myself 

And you. Only we two may interchange 

Each in the other what each has to give. 

Only we two are one, not you and night, 

Nor night and I, but you and I, alone, 

So much alone, so deeply by ourselves, 

So far beyond the casual solitudes, 

That night is only the background of our selves, 

Supremely true each to its separate self, 

In the pale light that each upon the other throws.

—Wallace Stevens

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There is a Zulu phrase, ‘Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu’, which means ‘A person is a person through other persons.’ 

This is a richer and better account, I think, than ‘I think, therefore I am.’

—Abeba Birhane

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