On the 183

“homeless vet hungry
help God bless.”

So read the 6x12 inch
greasy, creasy cardboard sign
held by this slight and
slightly disheveled baby-boomer
post-trauma Viet Vet,
or so he wants to portray
and have you believe,
pacing on a median
he waits for the light to turn RED,
and like a bull charges
with limpy, gimpy legs
to car windows
that are tinted and closed
obscuring those inside
who sit in AC comfort
on a hot South Florida
afternoon,
on occasion a window
glides open and an
offering is made,
an alm to this
Man-of-the-Median,
a coin, a bill, a cigarette,
accepted with profuse
inaudible sounds
aping thank-you
and blessings bestowed
on the benefactors,
whose values compel them
to donate, maybe despite
their misgivings of the venue
and the scene that is so
common on south Florida byways,
as cars speed away on GREEN,
to their private destinations
that blows dust and whatever
onto and into the beggar’s being,
the alms merchant returns
to the median; lost in his thoughts?
and awaits the next RED light and
donors of the highway designated
813.

©Tony Puma/MMXVI