This is my favorite poem ever. I'll let the Buddhist Monk writer Thich Nhat Hanh introduce it:
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After a long meditation, I wrote this poem. In it, there are three people: the twelve-year-old girl, the pirate, and me. Can we look at each other and recognize ourselves in each other? The tide of the poem is "Please Call Me by My True Names," because I have so many names. When I hear one of the of these names, I have to say, "Yes."

CALL ME BY MY TRUE NAMES

Do not say that I'll depart tomorrow
because even today I still arrive.

Look deeply: I arrive in every second
to be a bud on a spring branch,
to be a tiny bird, with wings still fragile,
learning to sing in my new nest,
to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower,
to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone.

I still arrive, in order to laugh and to cry,
in order to fear and to hope.
The rhythm of my heart is the birth and
death of all that are alive.

I am the mayfly metamorphosing on the surface of the river,
and I am the bird which, when spring comes, arrives in time
to eat the mayfly.

Thich Nhat Hanh

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WELL OF COURSE I AM

By Daniel Christopherson 

His mother brought him in. Ricky had been strumming his toy guitar every day, and she asked if it was too early for lessons.

Our beginning was tentative, although I have become accustomed to prying words out of kids in the first lesson. Ricky's wobbly fingers were unable to negotiate even the simplest one-finger chords. He was four and a half, my youngest student ever. I had him strum the strings, copying the rhythm of my playing.

When he smiled, light seemed to pour from his eyes as they alternated between his new teacher and our wildly strumming hands. As I gradually increased the speed, we clenched our teeth and exchanged growling facial expressions, racing toward a notes-flying-everywhere collision. We laughed together.

My favorite moment is when a child and I lose ourselves in laughter. Not at clever jokes, or someone coming "down to their level," not even smirks or giggles… real laughter … Looking each other right in the eye as we hold our stomachs. That's when you know you are buddies.

"Who are you trying to fool, telling me you are a beginner and then strumming like that? Are you going to give me lessons?!" We laughed like brothers finally together again.

Ricky's eyes occasionally wandering upward in his sockets. I would have panicked, but his relaxed demeanor told me there was no need for alarm.

We discussed the parts of the guitar. We played 'Simon says,' which is always a big hit. Soon Ricky was pointing to the sound-hole and bridge and tuners on his own guitar. The usual stuff you do with one of those miniature guitars guaranteed to stay out of tune through the next millennium.

We were together counting the strings when I noticed his confusion. His smile quickly vanished, and tears were suddenly pouring from his eyes. A terrified small voice cried, "I'll never count the strings!! …my big brothers tell me I can't think right!!!"

My stomach tightened as I quickly found myself mourning a child's terrible loss. I felt like the air had been knocked out of me with a 2 x 4. It was all I could do to smile while seeing the deep pain Ricky carried inside. I resorted to questions I was sure he could answer. Soon back on track, we were bobbing our heads to the rhythm of "Mr. Frog Is Full Of Hops." But the smile he gave me minutes ago was gone, tainted now by the haunt of doubt. 

"Ricky?" I had to say something.

His innocent eyes connected with mine. "Yes?"

"I think you are a special kid."

"Well of course I am," a whispered voice of reassurance left Ricky's lips as he looked downward. The announcement was so smooth that it could have passed without notice.

As though I had just glimpsed a ghost in the room, my mind struggled to make sense, to rewind to the wisdom of a saint before it melted like snow in the sunlight. Those aren't four-year-old words! As if God himself had uttered an immutable truth. Even as I recall the moment, it hurts to recall the agony felt by a beautiful and innocent child …over what others think.

Yet he was already in tow to the place where the rest of us have taken up residence. Where "who we are" becomes less important than "what we do," or what we tell ourselves careers or homes or things will get us. Where we pretend not to care about the dreams we left behind.

Ricky's brothers may have teased him ruthlessly, and for some, the sounds from his guitar may have been out of tune, but for Ricky… on that particular day and in that small room, the melody of his spirit was divine and unforgettable. A song for sure. A song wordlessly communicating his birthright to happiness. That we are not valuable because of what we can do or become. We are valuable because we are here.  

Little Ricky may not become a brilliant physicist or engineer, but with visible pride and joy, he could proudly demonstrate how his guitar could vibrate and clang and push out sounds as his fingers thrashed those out-of-tune strings. And he could sit with me and face his worst nightmare; that he is not as good as others say he should be.

My heart went out to Ricky, because he expressed the fear most of us endure in silence. That we are not good enough. Ricky taught me how to rise above the torture of feeling not good enough and being teased about what he could not change. "Well of course I am," was the innocent and Christ-like self-application of the love most spend our lives looking for.

Who were you trying to fool, Ricky? You were a song… long before you could count those strings. Before your little body walked into that room.

After that day, I had a dream that Ricky and I were standing before God. For some reason, I heard myself explaining that although others may think Ricky isn't good enough, he is beautiful and innocent. 

God answered, "Well of course I am!"