On this festive first of May, <br />Wending wistfully my way <br />Three sad sights I saw today. <br /> <br />The first was such a lovely lad <br />He lit with grace the sordid street; <br />Yet in a monk's robe he was clad, <br />With tonsured head and sandalled feet. <br />Though handsome as a movie star <br />His eyes had holiness in them, <br />As if he saw afaint, afar <br />A stable-stall in Bethlehem. <br /> <br />The second was a crippled maid <br />Who gazed and gazed with eager glance <br />Into a window that displayed <br />The picture of a ballet dance. <br />And as she leaned on crutches twain, <br />Before that poster garland-gay <br />She looked so longingly and vain <br />I thought she'd never go away. <br /> <br />The last one was a sightless man <br />Who to the tune of a guitar <br />Caught coppers in a dingy can, <br />Patient and sad as blind men are. <br />So old and grey and grimy too, <br />His fingers fumbled on the strings, <br />As emptily he looked at you, <br />And sang as only sorrow sings. <br /> <br />Then I went home and had a dream <br />That seemed fantastical to me... <br />I saw the youth with eye agleam <br />Put off his robe and dance with glee. <br />The maid her crutches threw away; <br />Her withered limbs seemed shapely fine; <br />And there the two with radiance gay <br />Divinely danced in soft entwine: <br />While the blind man, his sight restored, <br />Guitared the Glory of the Lord.<br /><br />Robert William Service<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/may-miracle/
