Diamonds, Ghosts & Dust

I ran into her yesterday
A penny pincher plied with cheap pilsner
What’s cheap?
She told me the daily drink specials
I was looking at her
She smoked basic cigarettes
And had a knockoff Coach bag
Cubic Zirconiums
A peacock scarf bunched
around her neck
She had the sparkle of someone who had given up
She had the resolution of an old television that still worked
She was without want
She spent her words like she spent her money
Tightly, but impact-fully
Annie wasn’t much to gaze at
Until you looked closer
If you leaned in, real near
She’d show you her magic
She didn’t acknowledge me
But she knew I had nothing else to look at
She sighed the capital letter of the sentence that followed
“God don’t care about none of this shit
And what you see ain’t what you get
He made diamonds from ghosts and dust
Don’t believe your lying eyes
Don’t try”

We were on the 20 bus last week
going south
He had on his church clothes
Fresh applied Brut masking smell 
A sambuca bender
To get the job you gotta smell the part
I watched him drop nickels and dimes
In the fare machine
Not a crinkled dollar to be found
In his couch pressed suit
Broke, broke as fuck
He reclined on the bench
Knee over knee like an executive
‘let me level with you’ conversations
'where the rubber meets the road' conversations
He opened a day old newspaper
Odds are he was reading the sports section
He spoke to me like he knew something I didn't
Of how to be successful...how to be a man
I called bullshit promptly
Pointing to his unpolished shoes
He didn’t get defensive
But he humbled a bit
“I am trying to get my life back on track
Lost my kids and my wife and my job
My condo and my Beemer-
I am back, though!
I still have my pride and my will to succeed”
Two seats back, an old sickly man interjected:
"Maybe you should have lost those first."

And I saw a boy on the bench during recess
Watching the other kids play
One shoe untied, glasses askew
Open eyed, but detached
A picture of contentment
if you know how to look
I watched an army of adults approach
One by one they spoke quietly to him
a soft hand on his shoulder, 
a kneeling down soft voice
To each, he replied with a smile
A slight shaking of his head
"No, thank you." He said.
Would you like to play football with the boys? - a teacher
Would you like to play hopscotch with the girls? - a playground volunteer
Want me to teach you how to climb the monkey bars?- the principal
Teeter-totter, tire swing, tiddly winks? - a lunch lady
Are you upset?   Are you okay? -all
And the army of concerned adults
Convened a council about the unsociable boy
beneath the bell mounted to the schoolhouse brick
"It's not normal!"
"Is it his home life, is he bullied, is he special?"
They conspired to have him meet the school counselor
To assuage their discomfort over the detached boy
Then.
A small nonchalant, matter-of-fact girl 
asked him he'd like to go for a walk
He accepted the invitation without assent
He moved slowing but immediately to follow
she asked why he didn’t play like the others
“I’m watching the invisible people.
I lose sight of them when I play.
I saw one keep Timmy from hitting his head when he fell.
And, when Joey said a curse word-
I saw his look at the sky and say 'sorry'
The one holding my hand is standing next to yours”
She smiled and asked “what about them?”
She pointed to the adult army huddled beneath the recess bell
“Theirs are in heaven praying for them”

There is something to learn from everyone
The ones that we think need help most, are teaching us
They are teaching us how to see
They are teaching us how to wait without worry

maybe they haven't fallen behind at all, 
but have already figured out the whole thing 

“But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world… to bring to nothing things that are.”

1 Corinthians 1:27-28 (ESV)