We All Offer Something

I’ve often dreamt of such another life:

Surrounded by a monument of steel

Which I would carry up and down the street

In retrospect and gilded circumstance,

No seeming shortage of a bended knee

In reverence to an opportunity

To send a thunderous wave into the crowd,

The cheering mass, the mob of cylinders

That wish to not purport themselves as spheres

As they see that I am just but a square

That fits itself into a triangle

To see if it can hide within its edge.

With one, or two, or several pints of ale,

I may grow much too bold for civil teeth,

As mine are filed to point upon myself

In want of more, or at least warmer food

Than what comes in a chilled, serrated glass.

I find I have all the time in the world,

But always not enough, and never still.

And as I leave my den in fortitude,

The moonlight pulls me to another road

Not so to tell me wisdom I should know,

But rather yet to show me as it is:

What I should think, or what I need to do,

Or, better, still, to seek what I should find

Behind a door that souls would knock upon

To end a journey wayward at their home

They figured all along would be their stop

To all their misanthropic wanderings

And halt their sprinting steps down to a crawl;

At once, they realize what they do not know

In hesitation fitting for a fool

That they renounce a fortune meant for kings

As if they thought they shrewdly earned a piece.

I am the silver shekel on the ground

A Pharisee would find, and in it goes

Into his silk embroidered pocket, deep

Out of the reach or sight of cherubim.

Or so I think, as I ionize there,

For what floats by me but a golden mite

That came down the same alley I would walk

Beneath the music of a lamplit room,

And I have cringed to see it last so long

Beside me, and would I then spurn its shine,

I would have lost my own instead of it.

I jolt awake, and both the golden mite

And I myself be-wheel and tumble out

And bounce down stoney steps into the night.

And fate would have it whistling through a dream

That taxmen dwell on after lengthy shifts

Outside their comfort zone: we find ourselves

Picked up by a poor man in tattered robes

Who has a smile that I cannot describe,

Except with pangs of sorrow and of joy

Upon inspection of my well-worn state.

He has not put in another pouch

As would a resident or greedy foe,

But holds us openly, so we can see

The faces passing by without a word

As He walks down a different alleyway;

All peoples fading, all except for one:

A weathered, weary widow clothed in rags,

Her chin tucked in her chest, and fingers clasped

As if the air she holds is all she had.

The Man who carries us now looks at her,

And the forgotten look he gave our souls

He gives to her as well, but something more

Is said: “My child, fear not the coming days,

For our tomorrows take care of themselves,

But it is not made so by their own hand.”

Then, both I and the golden mite did fall

Into her waiting palms; her countenance

Lights all the moonlight sky above with stars

That echo in the poor Man’s ageless eyes;

And He departs without another word

Formed on his tongue; the widow turns and goes

Her own direction, to the temple gate

And makes it just as they are closing down,

Her heavy breath and sweat within her palm

Does not give credence to her aching heart

As, beating faster still but light indeed,

She drops the two of us into the box

Of old collected coins and cheaper shills

Thrown in from lack of care or lack of use.

And we, small as we are, shine saintly bright,

For we had now been held aloft by Light.