The Cold Within
I am often amazed by what I find when I am actually looking for something else. Recently, while I was going through some of my old material, I found the poem below. It is only very loosely connected to what I was working on.
After thinking about it for a while I realized that, while the poem may not have been really connected to what I was working on, it actually does connect to all of us. I believe that is true regardless of where we are in life or the situation(s) in which we find ourselves.
I hope that you will do as I’ve done. I’ve read it and read it and read it again. I’ve also “looked into the mirror of my life” every time I’ve read it.
I had actually forgotten about the poem. I’m hoping that doesn’t happen again. Whether or not I remember all of the words, I hope I never forget the message. More than that, I pray that the message of the poem will have an impact on how I treat others.
-Jim Faughn
The Cold Within
Six humans trapped in happenstance
In dark and bitter cold,
Each one possessed a stick of wood,
Or so the story’s told.
Their dying fire in need of logs,
The first woman held hers back,
For of the faces around the fire,
She noticed one was black.
The next man looking across the way
Saw not one of his church,
And couldn’t bring himself to give
The fire his stick of birch.
The third one sat in tattered clothes.
He gave his coat a hitch,
Why should his log be put to use,
To warm the idle rich?
The rich man just sat back and thought
Of the wealth he had in store,
And how to keep what he had earned,
From the lazy, shiftless poor.
The black man’s face bespoke revenge
As the fire passed from sight,
For all he saw in his stick of wood
Was a chance to spite the white.
The last man of this forlorn group
Did naught except for gain,
Giving only to those who gave,
Was how he played the game.
The logs held tight in death’s still hands,
Was proof of human sin,
They didn’t die from the cold without,
They died from the cold within.
– by James Patrick Kinney –
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AUTHOR: Jim Faughn
