In name only

And thou shalt say before thy God, I have put away the hallowed things out of my house, and also have given them unto the Levite, and unto the sojourner, to the fatherless, and to the widow, according to all thy commandment.

Deuteronomy, 26.13

We made a covenant with the children of Israel: You shall not serve any but Allah and you shall do good to parents, and to the near of kin and to the orphans and the needy ... Then you turned back except a few of you and now too you turn aside.

The Koran, 2.83

The inconceivable powers of the Vow and of the Name are therefore one, and not the slightest difference between the two exists.

The Shin Buddhist Book of Tannisho

In Eden, God granted our species great pow'r

to share dominion and name all the creatures:

that familiarity might breed our

rev'rence for earth's diverse vital features.

Since Bliss, this calling has failed to impede

a master's contempt for beasts, no more than

for common nouns we entitle with need:

the homeless, wretched, poor, and the orphan.

My blink at small hands outstretched on this street

pulls blinds that untie, like twists of a knot,

oversight from overlook, smartly discrete

'mong objects: a sentence where I allot

the case for the foundling but no Proper Name.

Call a child beggar and I am to blame.

By James William Penha