So many look around the globe
and say, “How can I start
to help in what small way I can,
and find work with a heart?”
They look to spread their peace abroad,
and be more well received
than in their hometown neighborhoods,
if that can be believed.
If crime and hate and poverty
among the richly blessed
cannot be fought effectively,
what hope for all the rest?
If prisons, projects, trailerparks
and graveyards are the way
we bandage up our culture’s wounds,
what right have we to say
that our approach, our medicines,
our governments, our laws
are useful or appropriate
to correct others’ flaws?
If you would make a difference,
first, examine your own heart;
once your own house is in order,
then work down the block can start.
15 JUN 2005
