*****

Recorded Reading (4:51): https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/kjanejsbdm03ovjwu8rp0/Meeting-You.mp3?rlkey=9z4n1owy2c8ta815uenqbcfhf&st=wc3ew3c3&dl=0

*****

Meeting You

I know that you’ve faced challenges
Which I have never known ~
Shaped by diff’rent forces,
You different have grown

And yet, in spite of all those
Differences we can name
There are some other ways in which
We two continue just the same

Underneath the suit, the jeans,
The jacket or the hat,
Underneath the anorexic
Underweight or fat,

Underneath the slow or quick
Mind, or the healthy or the sick,
Determinedly humble or
Determinately slick,

Underneath the polish for which
Sycophancy pays its toll
Or the rough exterior
Which leaves its interior whole,

Right along with temp’rament,
Right along with mood,
Right along intention with
To do bad or good,

Mixed up with the give and take
Of daily reciprocity,
In every single one of us
Looking deeper we can see

That which in development
Hath played the largest part
Aspiring always to the higher:
The ever-innocent heart

Though shrouded ‘neath the detritus
Of agonized betrayal
Which comes to every spirit
Journeying beneath this veil

It lives, it beats in harmony
With every other heart on Earth
Not differently from our own
Of equal intrinsic worth

So, from my heart to yours,
I may this day reach out to you
Although political opinion
Might seek to set us askew,

Although one of us, comfortable,
Everything has got
Needful to his daily life,
And one of us has not,

Even though, it’s true, the
Common people passing by
Give us hairy eyeballs
Wondering just why

We’d pause and open up the gates
Of each personal fort
To bring to one another
A little old-fashioned comfort

The glance which tells us we are seen
The smile which lets us know we’re heard,
In time of discouragement
The light’ning and enlight’ning word,

The sense that while on smaller matters
We might sometimes disagree
It doesn’t change the fact that you
Are darn good company

And that if we sat down a while
Watching all the folks go by
We might regret our former distance
Yes, we might just wonder why

We had let come between us
Issues which melt away
In the warmfull sunshine of
A hazy autumn day,

Might find that we discover,
Might discover that we learn
About one another
That we share the very same concerns

How to keep the children fed
Where to put them safe to bed
Dry and happy, safe and warm
Amid the thick of Nature’s storm,

Might find that on one balance or
Another we might disagree
But on that balance’s importance
Absolutely do agree

It’s harder to run roughshod o’er
A man that we already know,
It makes we pause consider to
Whether we might more softly go

And take the ninety eight cents,
But perhaps give up the two
So those who labor under us
Might have a little hope to view,

Might not be so eager
To put a man outside his door
When there are empty houses
Around us by the hundred score

So, whatever the life you’ve led,
Whatever the path you’ve walked,
Whatever the pain you’ve known,
Whatever language you’ve talked,

We can this sure assurance
To the table bring ~
For all of our divisiveness
We’re really saying the same thing

So let the passing people look
A second time, as they will do ~
I’m not looking at them, brother,
I’m happy to meet you!

*****

*****

This poet presently lives at a fraction of her nation’s poverty level.

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