My Heart Is Pierced by Gentle Things

(Old Beggar by Vasily Tropinin - found here)

My heart is pierced by gentle things

Caught in cruel circumstances.

By drunkards and druggies
Dandies and dropouts:
All these rend asunder
The calculated calcification
Of my starched-stiff self.

My heart is moved
Toward each and all these
Vessels of the image Divine
Long or lately defaced by garish graffiti
Of post-lapsarian pride.

And when I permit my eyes to search
The heavy, knowing pairs of theirs
I see they see I see in them
And I dare say they see it in me too:
Our Lord’s own Passion renewed.

Such a knowing glance
Between such distant men
Not so distant
Really
But really very much the same.

The thirsty glance of piercéd hearts
Leads each a small step further
Along the Way’s way
And to Love’s sweet refrain:
“You did it for me.”

~Barnabas McHenry