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Antoinette Kopperfield
The Throbbing Heart
He stands on a streetcorner
with a cup half-empty,
and coins are tossed to him
like a seal in shallow water,
and he is hungry for another meal.
His eyes of hope catch your glance
if you are looking,
and if turn away
you will never know his pain.
His full-time job is survival.
Though he is dry
and thirsty from the sun,
his legs are tired with no chair,
and though sometimes
he feels like giving up,
he asks again.
I saw his face and his gratitude,
and though my gift was small,
he said 'thank you' and he moved on.
There was another car
with another driver,
and like mine,
his heart was throbbing with compassion.
Read poems about / on: car, sometimes, water, hope, pain, sun, heart, time, thanks
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I think the man you speak of had more compassion in his eyes than you or the driver. You could go a lot further with your thinking before you start writing but dont give up on the whole quite a good poem with imagination and depth. Please get better. Youre good!
There is a danger here of 'knowing' what everyone is thinking. It would be better to show what each person did to make you think that. There must be a word missing in the third line of the second stanza. When you say 'he asks again' I looked back to see where he asked the first time. Again, this poem needs to be reworked. You have some good images and I love your subject matter. Haven't we all seen these guys on street corners? Oh, another thing...a thought crossed my mind when I read the second line...'Is the cup half full or half empty? ' Perhaps you could think of a way to describe his cup without the overused phrase.