The Breaks

I keep it on a hook in the back of the coat closet,
My green umbrella.
But there’s nothing but sun to see,
(A red-orange streak cuts across the dusk),
No use to carry it with me.
It’s nice to know I have it, though.

Come for a walk outside, you say,
On account of my being blind,
And you seem just the guide
I need.

Walk I do
And meet the task with diligence,
Describing fields and streams and pheasant prints.

So, one could see
That the reason makes no sense to me
Why you smash my wrists against a tree
Then mention casually,
It has begun to rain.
One hand grips me and one picks back up your walking cane.

Fetch your umbrella, ye good lass.
Hurry, I don’t wish me clothes be wetted fast.
I say, I’m sorry but I can’t;
How can I hold an umbrella with broken hands?

~~~
Author’s Note:
Sometimes people ask you for help because you possess something to offer them. Something they need. In the process of helping them, they harm you somehow. Despite this, they expect more and more from you but unfortunately you are unable to continue interacting with them due to their own actions or disregard for you as a person. That was my insight behind the poem. The irony of the very person who came to you in weakness asking for help is the same one who “breaks the bones in your hands” then expects more help, reminds me of those great ironies in so many classic Twilight Zone episodes. 

(Also, please know that, although I was writing/planning a poem on this same theme, a friend of mine happened to tell me a random, stray line of poetry that was something along the lines of “a person not being able to hold an umbrella with broken hands” and gave me permission to use it and did not want co-authorship credits when I offered. That line sparked me writing the whole rest of the poem. God bless (and God, thank you for) all the muses, the friends, the strangers who do something good for another person without seeking recognition.) 

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