A VISION

A while back
I had a vision
over down and left
in my visual field--
try it--
maybe you'll find the same.

I don't know where I was,
so maybe I had it
several times.
I saw
a Darkness with Lights,
like the Van Gogh
café with stars.

It was a Sight
of the Substance of the World
(which is too much with us)
of the World as Working for Money

Almost everybody
doing things
they don't
want to do
for the Legal Abstraction,
cheating whenever
they can
in attention
and in time
and intention,
trying to cop a look
or a thought
of Something Else
Something More
Something Connected

to butterflies
or longing
or a breeze
or forgotten ancestors
whippoorwills in the orchards
of time.

I saw the Other People,
the Lucky Ones
who think
they are doing what
they
Want to Do.
And I saw that
they were
Deformed
and Sad Besides.

Then I saw a few
Other People
doing
what they mostly want to do.
Little people
like the wisps
of the lavender cotton
of the pennyroyal
in August.

People who mostly
don't know they are
Blessed
because
they are Busy
Getting By.

But what I really
want to know:
Is there a life

Before the $

besides the $

after the no $

for you ..&

for me?

Anna McCarthy
Poverty Pudding
Spring 2000
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