A Cry from One who Wanders the City Street

Something unusual happened to me that caught me complete by surprised. A block south of the Washington Monument (the original one in Baltimore) on Charles Street, I was stopped by a homeless man who didn't want food or money. He said that since accepting Jesus as his Lord and Savior, the Lord has been providing for all his needs. All he wanted was a hug. He explained that because he has AIDS, he has not had any human touch in a very long time. But he assured me that all his sours are currently healed so I am not endangered of contracting the disease from him. As I hugged him, he broke down and started crying streams of tears. At which point, he broke off our embrace because he didn't want any of his body fluid to get on me. Suddenly, he quickly ran off. Although I constantly keep an eye out for him when I'm in that neighborhood, I never saw him again.

No longer does tomorrow exist for me,

Just the recurrence of subsequent todays,

Because hope is tomorrow's admission fee;

And mine is buried beneath a hundred clichés.

Tell me I'm more than the sum of body parts.

Tell me I'm not reduced to nothing by my sorrow.

Open your arms and share the warmth of your heart.

Rekindle my soul to see again tomorrow.

City After Midnight

Due to the unusual hours that I keep, I, often, go shopping after midnight at 24-hour a day supermarkets and drugstores. Several nights ago, during one of my late night shopping trips, I saw a sight that broke my heart. I've been thinking about it since. I finally decided write about it.

Cruel is the lonely city night

Blind to the misery of this sight.

The sparse traffic passes

But doesn't see, doesn't hear, doesn't feel

The desperation of their plight.

On the corner where McCulloh and MLK meet

Hunger hangs heavily on the faces of the street.

Two hours past midnight,

A little girl and her grandmother

Are begging for something to eat.

What does it take to make things right?

A five was all that I can spare, tonight.

As I pull away I see no tear being shed

Under the blinking traffic light.

In the Service of our King

Depart, if you seek the glories of war.

It is not what this march is for.

Commissioned we are

To serve

In the Lord's advance guard.

We march long and hard among the dead

Down this nocturnal road where evil treads,

Commissioned we are

To serve

In the Lord's advance guard.

Meals of only His wine and bread.

In remembrance of his thorn crowned head.

Commissioned we are

To serve

In the Lord's advance guard.

Charges of dragoons and snipers' fires

Laid our comrades on funeral pyres.

Commissioned we are

To serve

In the Lord's advance guard.

Howitzer fires, and shrapnel and flak

No artillery piece could turn us back.

Commissioned we are

To serve In the Lord's advance guard.

Belt, breastplate, helmet and shield

Protect us in the potter's field.

Commissioned we are

To serve

In the Lord's advance guard.

Our weapon is His Spirit's sword

The Word of God which can't be ignored.

Commissioned we are

To serve

In the Lord's advance guard.

Tempted to give chase when we pierced their flanks.

The line, we hold steady, we don't break rank

Commissioned we are

To serve

In the Lord's advance guard.

Patiently we wait for His trumpet's call

When we finally charge and take it all.

Commissioned we are

To serve

In the Lord's advance guard.

We march long and hard among the dead

Down this nocturnal road where evil treads,

Commissioned we are

To serve

In the Lord's advance guard.

Don Quixote Grows Up

Shortly after I graduated from college, I decided that I wanted to make a difference in this world. so, I moved to Baltimore, into the city, to be involved with programs for helping the economically disadvantaged.

In the passing years, I've been held up at gun point. And I've been ripped-off by people that I'm trying to help.

If I had made some kind of impact in my neighborhood, I may be willing to say that it's all worth it. However, day in and day out, nothing seems to change.

Not only have I not made an impact in my neighborhood, I'm beginning to see it impact me. I'm less patient with those I'm helping and more distrustful of anything they say. There's been days in which I started to think that they deserved to be where they are.

So, I held up the mirror and wrote the following.

I mourn the passing of my youth

As it gasps for the last breath

Of its quixotic dream.

No single self-evident truth

Survived this untimely death,

Without a trace downstream.

The promises of tomorrow

No longer have their allure

No longer fuel my hope.

Broken lives, broken hearts, and sorrow

A field of dreams with manure

Made me this misanthrope.

The Mystery of Bella's Blue

Why wouldn't Bella reveal

The mystery of her blue

Even as you wait

While sitting beside her?

Did she hide in her poems

Something to give us a clue?

Words or syllables

That we can decipher.

A Poem for Little Ball Blue

Colleen posted a sketch of a ball with a sad face and shaded blue. With it, she wrote a poem entitled "Ball Blue".

I replied with the following poem.

My heart is sad
When you are sad.

I wish that I can shield from you
All things bad

And chase, from the skies, the stormy clouds
That made blue the little ball on your sketch pad.

What can I do,
Little ball blue?

I'm here and you are there;
My options are few.

So I knelt and prayed that He pours out
The abundance of His awesome love on you.

Monkey With His Fist in a Narrow Neck Jar / Disney Girls Gone Wild

OK, I admit it, I watch "Entertainment Tonight" and "Access Hollywood".  After a long day at work, and after watching the local and the national news broadcast, I let my mind veg out on mental junk food.

Lately, the entertainment news has been mostly about grown up Disney girls "Gone Wild": Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Vanessa Hudgens,... These girls thought they have stardom but instead stardom has them.

The girls' lives reminded me of how they catch monkeys in the southeast Asia.

To catch the monkey, they put dates into a jar. The neck of the jar is just barely wide enough for the monkey to stick his hand into when the hand is not clinched. However, the neck of the jar is not wide enough for the monkey to take his hand out when it is holding a date. For some reason, the monkey is unwilling the let go of the date in the jar, despite not being able to take his hand out.

So I wrote the following.

Monkey with his fist in a narrow neck jar,

He's ruled by his belly,

So he just won't let go...

He just won't let go.

The Man, with a monkey wagon, not too far,

He came from New Delhi

To bring the monkey woe...

Bring the monkey woe.

Monkey has a collar with a big brass star

Does tricks on the tele

To make the Man some dough...

Make the Man some dough.

Disney girl, with cash, driving a fancy car,

Does tricks on the tele,

She's an attention ho.

An attention ho.

Monkey with his fist in a narrow neck jar...