Soka Gakkai International Gulf (SGI-Gulf) in partnership with the education cluster of Tecom, Dubai Knowledge Village and Dubai International Academic City, successfully hosted the third edition of “The Poetic Heart: Connecting Humanity” on Thursday.
Held at the Knowledge Village auditorium, The Poetic Heart — a poetry symposium bringing together eminent poets to promote harmony, understanding and peace — saw students, as well as well-known poets from around the world recite inspiring poems.
Speaking about the initiative, Dr Akash Keiji Ouchi, SGI representative for South Asia and the Middle East, said: “The Poetic Heart is not just a poetry recitation session, but our expression to reach out and connect while reminding ourselves of the core values of peace, harmony, justice and peace. In today’s obdurately self-centric existence, this event is a gentle reminder to keep the poet within alive — nurturing values of righteousness, courage, altruism and optimism.”
The event witnessed a distinguished gathering of poets who shared their poetic masterpieces on topics such as world peace, harmony, justice and protection of the environment. The poets included Shaikha Al Mutairi, Ali Al Shaali, Geeta Chabbra, Talal Salim Al Sabiri, Rad Aman, Nimah Nawwab, Shihab Ghanem, Daisaku Ikeda, Silvana Salmanpour, Ali Khalil Al Alsayegh, Sethu Kumanan, Abdul Hakeem Alzubaidi, Purnima Verman, Qais Ghanem, Kailash C. Mathur, Dr Akram Jamil Konbos, Dr K. Satchidanandan, Dr Manfred Malzahn, Prof Francesca Corrao, and Dr Hassan Elmrani.
The agenda involved poem recitation by 20 poets as well as budding poets from schools across the UAE. Special Guests of Honour included Dr Ayoub Kazim, managing director of Tecom Investments Education Cluster. Youth from educational institutes across the UAE and Japan were also present.
Geeta Chhabra, a poet with translated works in Arabic, said: “The event this year has gone extremely well and has evolved much better compared to last year. The Poetic Heart: Connecting Humanity is moving in the most purposeful direction.”
Poems were recited in Arabic, Italian, French, German, Malayalam, Urdu, English, Persian, Tamil, and Japanese.
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