“A Christmas Carol”

--by Ellen Sander
Belfast, Maine

A poor child from the projects
writes a letter asking for a towel
so she doesn’t have to use her brothers’
already wet and cold.
Her mother cringes in shame
What she brings home is never enough.

I saw a shopkeeper beat a man senseless
for stealing a bunch of bananas.
What does he care that I’ll never go in there again?
He is angry. He can’t make it alone.
What he brings home is never enough.

The homeless, despairing in the streets
and the homesick, despairing in the condos
the sales in the malls depleting
credit card opulence and poverty of spirit
there is no way out until it’s over.
What they bring home is never enough.

The urban hunger aches
for that scrap of tinsel or some sparkle
to illuminate the dread
of getting up in the morning; they are
gorged and bloated on eggnog and hams
full of seasonal adulterants,
poison for profit, remedies for sale
antacids, tranquilizers, fat substitutes
substitutes for comfort, ease and good sense:
What they bring home is never enough.

The broken toys of mornings after
chase us through the season
through decades, they ridicule the
feast and famine of heart.
The broken hearth
of season’s greetings mock us;
we comply numbly, feigning gayety
waiting on the food lines of the missions
What we bring home is never enough.