Poetic messages of encouragement lift spirits in epidemic

Though the spread of the novel coronavirus is a bleak moment for the world, it has also been the cause of heartwarming scenes, as people from different countries or cultural backgrounds reach out to each other, sometimes in a quite poetic way.

Here are some of the touching poems sent along with donations to epidemic-hit areas.

"Great distance cannot separate us, we all live in a united world."（道不遠人，人無異國）

It is a poem written on a banner hanging on a truck carrying 25,000 surgical masks donated by the Chinese Embassy in South Korea to the city of Daegu, epicenter of the viral spread in the country.

The poem was written by Choe Chi-won, a Korean scholar who once pursued study in China during the Tang Dynasty (618-907) for many years.