The ballad of charity

Born addicts: Some people will get hooked on anything

New Scientist, 8 September 2012

Could she spare some change?

Not as a rule, too stuck in her ways

she strode on past, but paused

at her office door to reevaluate—

the question was not ‘would’

but ‘could’, and of course the answer was ‘yes’

or maybe even ‘should’,

so ‘no’  was wanting even as a test

of logic, and morally in-

excusable, so retracing her steps

to where the beggar sat

she bent and palmed her fifty pence.

The resulting endorphin hit

set off in her brain a chain reaction.

She embarked on a giving spree

unrivaled by any major religion,

gave away all she owned

and as much as she could beg and borrow,

lived in doorways and sold

her body for money to buy the Big Issue

(which she returned unread

to the same vendors so they could resell them

to her again and again),

she kidnapped tycoons and held them to ransom

beheading live on the web

any whose wives refused outright

her demands on behalf of the needy,

while those who put up less of a fight

could expect the safe return

of their husbands, albeit not all at once,

she dealt in crack cocaine,

she trafficked slaves, she peddled guns,

but each donation paled

against the buzz of the previous one

and when Oxfam refused her aid

she laid down her burden, the giving done.

She died in a hail of gunfire

an enigmatic smile on her lips,

knowing the ambush was there

she gave her only remaining gift.

(c) 2012 Slush Poet