HER PAIN

HER PAIN

This is dedicated to you
acrylic paint on canvas by Robert Margetts

In the most tender hour a life was born

given to a poor woman with nothing to give.

Poor and decrepit

old and ugly.

No family to help, no friends to beg,

each day a struggle to survive

She stole for food,

wrapped him in paper

fed him from dirty needles

and bathed him in the sewer waters

And he was happy

for he knew nothing of greed nor prejudice.

He knew only of the kind face that loved him.

And she too was happy

for someone did love her

and cared not about her wealth

For three years a boy learned

to crawl, walk, google, and talk.

He learned love and pain

hunger and thirst

coldness and wetness

And for three years she did learn

what it meant to have nothing but to give everything,

to see pain in the eyes of a child

and to know that you were solely to blame

In the cold Winter of 1987

the baby fell ill.

His screams of pain pounded in her bones

as she begged for help upon deaf ears.

He who had so much would give nothing

and she with child looked the other way.

And one night the old lady crouched

down in a puddle of slush,

lay the young lad upon the blanket of snow.

And with a kiss on his cheek

and a pat on his head,

tears trickled from her eyes

as the baby lay dead.

And for the first time in her life, the old lady

really understood pain

and she cried, and cried.