Walking On

The Rev. John Fairbrother

Walking On

 

“Five dollars to sit on my bean bag”
cries the entrepreneurial beggar:
“Loose change for food” a couple write,
between fast food and foreign bank,
while one eats a bagel; tourists, shoppers,
workers, students and I walk on.

Queen Street bearer of little pride,
a human ravine profiling poverty,
privilege, desire and need:
Old and nouveau riche displaying behind
dust of neglect, anger, despair,
confusion, addiction’s pain-filled escape.

A city’s pride, inviting the world, denying
prophetic ones, lower than comfort’s
humility, lingering where food
and fashion gather dollars, convinced
profit is example enough
for enough to live.

This Queen of streets, parades
questions of any who pass to see:
Sediment of eroding, competitive
forces,  living stones, obstructing
clear passage over the vaunted
successful way.

The bean bag green, the hawker
worn, a scrawled fading
message: Reflections not of hunger
or hope, merely the lost;
voices raised, questions laid, while eyes
flick on and feet stir the dust.

© John Fairbrother                                                                                    
March 2015

Image Activity on Queen Street, John Keith Reed