As a child, I was acutely sensitive
To life’s misfortunes and inequities.
Even now, skin dappled, hair gray,
I recall quite clearly the anguish I felt
When, as a little boy clutching a maternal hand,
I had my first encounter with a man with a can.
We were Christmas shopping in the city center,
Among wise men and rain deer and cotton snow,
When we came upon a man seated on the sidewalk,
Clutching a cardboard sign in soiled fingers,
Offering what today I would see as irony –
God’s blessing in return for alms.
Decades later I often feel guilty
That my luck has been better than most.
I used to wonder if perhaps God is cruel,
To sow seeds he must know will fail.
But now I think nature knows as well as we
Not every acorn becomes a tree.
The Yankee Poet 