Granted Poem by Kamran Qureshi

Granted was my desire for a son.
You're six months old, and at such
tender an age, you do me great service
that no one else does. You make me believe again.
You make me want to have faith - again.
And I don't mean faith in God. But faith in man.
In the essence of man. Humanity.
That - had been missing - for God alone knows
how long.

Yesterday, as I held you,
you took my glasses, threw them and giggled.
You made me think of my childhood.
Of how free I must have been then: Guiltless,
naturally honest to the core.
Was I ever?

As I hold you now under the sun, I wonder
how people too can glow. Something of which
I have nothing to show.
Except these shoes, every morning I shine.
But they too collect dust by the second of time.
And each night as I return, they're covered in grime.
Every time.