Friday Poem: "Man's Hand"

Man’s Hand

Before turning away
                                 sometimes I stare
at limbless beggars
with their crayoned cardboard signs

Down on my Luck

Luck                   or
dread design of
a world made by men

Follow this life
back to its beginnings
whom shall we find
what beast disclose
who ravages the crib

Man’s work
man’s hand in all things

7/31/94-2/24/95, 6/29/98

Copyright 1998 by Maurice Leiter

Reprinted with permission