I Watch Her Everyday

Some critique would be loved as this needs some more work.

I watch her every day on my way to work;

she rarely moves and when she does it’s merely go find a comfortable spot.

In the winter her skins cracks from snow;

after years she has become numb to the conditions of the weather.

She has aged more rapidly than most;

her life is unrelenting with no respites.

I watch her every day on my way to work;

there is little that changes from day to day.

A scarf may be there from a trip to a tenement overnight;
an old hat may be another addition.

The thing that will never change is her small little can;

it has the word ‘Give’ on it a multitude of times, for she cannot speak.

I watch her every day on my way to work;

there are bags in her hand, bags of nothingness.

I have never looked within them;

I imagine rags and more plastic bags.

Nothing and everything;

a life of destitution, sorrow, and pain.

I watch her every day on my way to work;

standing beneath the sign of the East Broadway Cafeteria.

It’s a busy place;

even so, she rarely makes enough to buy more than a cup of soup.

She must have a family somewhere;

I wonder who they are and what they do.

People dismiss her, bustling pass, going on their way.

I try to help when I can;

the world is hard and money is hard to make.

She is the nameless beggar with a hard life;

I watch her every day on my way to work.