Stained

Stare at the sun. Stare at a lightbulb. Close your eyes. Do you see it? The harsh glare has stained the back of your eyelids. Even when you open them, this greenish-yellow blob continues to interfere with your vision. It only disappears if you stop staring at the source. It`s like the blazing brutality has branded your eyeballs...temporarily.

My eyes have seen other glaring images that have permanently stained my perspective. The scenes are dirty and hard to erase from my mind. The source of these stains are on the streets. I close my eyes and I see a 7 year old boy with an aging squeegie, swiping the windshields of protesting taxi drivers as his younger sister pleads their impoverished case from the sidewalk. I open my eyes and I see weathered women, extending bobbing, cupped palms. Their bottom lips are pouting and their black eyes plead, "Please...one boliviano...to buy bread".....for the babies suckling at their bare breasts.
I close my eyes again and shake my head, but this time I see a man missing half of all four of his limbs. Course rope holds pieces of black tire to what remains has he swings his lower stumps through the upper ones, slowly conquering the steep cobblestone street. With my eyes open or closed, I see men with uncut hair and curling fingernails, passed out and using a rock as a pillow in the middle of a public plaza.

The sad sights are everywhere. I don`t even have to stare, the scenes are staring at me. A boliviano doesn´t fall into every bobbing hand, but I try to lock eyes with the person and hope that the lumination of Christ in me will leave it´s mark on them. These people have branded me and it interferes with my vision. I can´t look at anything the same ever again. I stop looking and their silhouettes stay with me...they don`t disappear like the blobs from bulbs do. I´ve set my gaze on those in distress, but so far I feel like a useless, gawking bystander at the scene of an accident.

God grant me the wisdom and strength to keep looking...to become more than just an onlooker. May the bleaching effects of time never fade the stains that these streets have left in me.