I’ve been told not to hand a dollar
or a twenty out a car window
to a man on a corner by a stop light
holding up a scribbled cardboard sign
His scattered oily hair, yellow skin,
clouded eyes, unsettle me
Conventional wisdom dictates
he’ll just buy booze or drugs
On another corner on my way walking
past a fast food joint three young
black ladies stand jiving, jangling coins
in used paper cups and I say,
“I only give to organized charities,”
but the liveliest holds up her cup and grins,
“Hey, mister, I am an organized charity!”
She too is nondeductible as I was
on late July nights after escaping
my family home at seventeen
from a crazy father and learned
to toss on the boards of park benches
and the cushions of a front porch glider
at the house of an old high school friend
who took a chance, woke me before dawn
so his parents would not find me asleep
I don’t remember saying, “Thank you,” only
having him send me forth quiet and confused
into the hazy morning
Must be an instinct, the theology of eyes,
to stick a hand through air to another’s hand
stained with loss, dirt and pain