Death of a Generous Spirit

There are times I can hardly recognize the old man in the mirror. Just six short months of searching for work and finding only souls more worried than I am about the future, have left an empty cavern, deep inside, where a generous spirit once burned brightly. The once nearly weightless responsibility for supporting my family, so easily borne and haughtily carried, has become a dread companion, a shadowy reminder of arrogantly sunny days gone dark with the threat of misfortune and lack.

As I struggle to meet each new day with a smile on my face and to keep hope alive and faith burning somewhere in the deep -- a silent prayer for freedom from the fear of failure -- I still feel the vast emptiness where a once generous (if a bit thrifty) spirit dwelled in uneasy harmony with my more practical Scottish heritage. I mourn its demise and I pray for its rebirth.

Mick

Death of a Generous Spirit

What happened to my old impulse to share?
I looked, and I can't find it anywhere...
When fortunes changed, and abundance drifted
Away on the tides, my outlook shifted
From focus on bounty to fear of dearth,
Giving Dicken's old Scrooge a second birth --
Tipping the balance to hoard each penny,
Spend only for me, and not share any.
It hurts me almost more than I can bear,
Each time that I bypass a chance to share;
Dark shadows cry constantly in my head,
That the times are tough and sharing is dead.
My heart grieves so, I can't bear to hear it,
For the death of a generous spirit.

Mick McKellar
August 2009