Prayers As Donations

I'm tired of seeing you boxed up

in cardboard and army fatigue, threadbare in 20 degrees.

And I'll be walking around you so lightly,

hoping that you won't disturb me

from making my retreat, from making my retreat.A long time ago, we paved our cities over bones.

We made cadavers into roads,

and when we gave prayers, we gave them as donations

and lingered with impatience

as the casket was shut on your fingers.You lost your face in the elements

but God, I'm no sociologist

with the ways and the means to recover this.

But I'll stick my hands in the court of injustice

with five bucks for some AIDS orphans I've never met

or for median-vendor veterans.So will you give me what I came here for?

Forgiveness, nothing more.