The Man Who Fell Among Thieves

by Maribeth Wright Curry on Sunday, August 29, 2010 at 3:22am

The sermon of the Good Samaritan
Is always about the Rescuer
And the awful people who ignored
The Man Who Fell Among Thieves.

Why doesn't anyone talk
About the man?
The man who lay there
For who knows how long?

No one talks
About his fear, his loss, his pain.
About how hard it was to watch
People ignore him again and again.

Is this the first example of abuse
By those charged with protection?
The priest, the Levite- and all the others
Who pretended he wasn't there?

No one preaches on it
Because no one wants to admit
The person lying there,
Distraught and in anguish- exists.

People ignore those in pain,
Or they gossip about them,
Or 'correct' them, try to
Disciple them

But no one seems to bother
To put themselves in their shoes
And experience the loss and pain
They feel again and again.

Are Christians the worst?
Maybe, maybe not-
But the pain they inflict on
Others is excruciating.

When it's doled out to those
Who were ministers
Whose lives only existed to serve others
Who knows, who cares?

It's so easy to 'forget'
The ones who lie on the road.
To let the weeds grow up around them
Pretend they aren't even there.

Then along comes a Samaritan?
Who is that?
Is there a Samaritan somewhere
For me?

So when I'm done
And nearly gone
Who hears my cry
Or shall I die?