The body that moved like a perfect machine, with the legs that reached the moon, the bright round eyes which surveyed the world, the shy tongue that said very little, the shyness that killed, the contagious humility and the generosity, which fed the world, now rests in the hands of the Transcendent.

The world is mourning your death, but your soul is now dancing in heaven.

Michael, the unrealized dream to visit the historic Ethiopia is considered done. Dance Michael! Sing it Michael!

I see you dancing for God in heaven, where your soul is resting, and your body is now freed from the contingencies of suffering.

We are the world, you said; the Ethiopian world is ours you added. You sung to comfort the patients of famine, the language of Ethiopian poverty. You motivated your fellow singers to sing for the Ethiopian world, and Ethiopians will continue to herald your name, and sing for you in their hearts.

Socrates is right. The soul is immortal; it lives on, and so is your soul Michael.

I one for one will never stop remembering, will never live without your music.

Shame us Ethiopians Michael. Whereas you saw the shared destinies of human kind, embodied in a single world, we Ethiopians cannot even enjoy our Ethiopian world.

Divided by the shortsightedness of Ethnocentricity,we remain divided, whereas you sung for us reminding the world that there in one humanity, the center of Being, and racism and ethnocentricity are nothing more than irrelevant distractions.

Michael, you saw through the hollowness of appearances and entered the intimate spheres of humanity, of the single world to which we are born, and from which we exit.

You came to this world and entertained us for forty-five years with a brilliance, which has no match, and a body born to dance.