Horace Gregory
THE BEGGAR ON THE BEACH
I have not come here to talk,
I have come to sit; I have been transplanted
From the cornerstone of a First National Bank
On a windy street to root myself
In pebbles, shells, and sand;
It is my shadow and not my arm
That holds out its fingers in an empty glove
Which might so easily be mistaken for a hand.
My silence is
The unheard cries of those who swim
Where no raft follows, where sails, masts, funnels
Disappear up-ocean into a wave that travels
Eastward beyond the thin horizon line;
At my left shoulder there is a cloud
That gathers into a storm
On a beach-crowded Sunday afternoon-
The cloud my shadow's twin in the tide's swell
Which churns gold waters into lead and silver
At its will.
Tell me my riddle:
I am not a mirage, but a being in flesh
Born of a sea that has neither
Waves nor shore, nor moon, nor star:
That was my misfortune. Have you a better
Fortune? are you forever young, handsome, rich
In friends? poor in fear? happy in doubt?
Sad in•nothing? hopeful
in
dark?
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