Ruth Bech

Ruth Bech Poems

The Best Poem Of Ruth Bech

Last Grain Of Sand

I kneel before you, a sinner
not confessing to anything I have done
but to my lack of action
my lack of answers even to the questions put forth by myself
I confess to closing my ears to your crying -
you made me feel uneasy - being a woman and all - and crying
like a child I confess to walking past the beggar in the street, angered
by her presence, her disgrace and her needy needs - her inner child
sleeping in her lap
like a token of a broken future
innocent - to life, to gods and to the law
innocent to the rules and tradition

innocent, I confess to double standards
because without them there would be none
I confess to truths - there are so many
that for long I have not spoken mine

there is no shame
no shame at all for the things I did but
plenty for the ones I left undone and to that I confess
not to gain clemency because I have learned there isn't any

I am not wasting time now the clock is ticking
and before the last grains of sand runs through the hour glass, I need
to make you see how committing no sin can make us sinners of complicity
by knowing and not understanding
by seeing and not realizing
by hearing and not reacting
and thinking but not doing...

I bow my head in shame of time spent
in front of mirrors of
time spent in front of pictures and women and beggars
with eyes wide shut
I beg forgiveness for all this I know of now
and all I will know later that
I should have known

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