Hungry

A man kneels and begs like he’s the prodigal son. He’s down at the other end of the subway car—the end where there’s more bickering and flirting and sudden, high-pitched laughter.

I sit, here, opposite a sleeping man and feel excluded.

The man makes his way up the car. He passes and supplicates and passes and supplicates again.

“Please. I need money. I’m hungry. I need to eat,” he repeats, approaching every seated passenger.

I nestle close to the wall, shut my eyes, yawn, and pretend to sleep. He’s coming, I know. He’s coming, I see, peeking through a shutter of recently propped eyelashes.

I tell myself: I’m not a cold soul, I’m not a heartless conservative yearning for self-sufficiency and a mcmanshion in the suburbs…I’m a modern-day liberal. I pity this man.

But, what am I to do? There are so many like him. Some loud, some softly mumbling, some silently bowed. They each need a quarter here, a sandwich there, a bottle of water…And I can’t give it to them all. I really can’t.

His arrived—body hunched, hands cupped—at my seat.

“Please help,” came in a whisper, a faint addition to the “dhuh,” “dhuh” of the subway car colliding with the tracks and the “hah,” “hah” of several amused passengers.

“I don’t have anything,” I lied, grasping my bag like Judas at the Last Supper.

"The Secret"

Somewhere between the Clark Street and Nevins subway stops, a man went “huh,” I went “huh,” and he thought we had gone “huh” together. In fact, my “huh” was autonomous. It was a response to the day’s news--more disappointing developments from Iraq, staggering conditions in Sierra Leone, and a revelation that one Washington, D.C. school only recently removed an American flag with 49 stars--not a sign of communion with this man.
He lifted his head and stared at me.
“Have you read this book,” he said.
I looked up from the newspaper, gave him a subdued smile, and looked down again.
“It’s a great book,” he said. “You should read it instead of that newspaper. Newspapers are so negative. This is positive.”
Another smile.
“They are so negative,” he continued, “This is the real deal.”
He clutched the book to his chest.
“Yes,” I said. “But you see, I need to read this. I am a journalist.”
“Oh. Well, this is about positive…positive thought. The secret to everything,” he asserted.
Indeed, the book was called “The Secret.”
“But you probably already know the secret,” he went on.
My eyes returned to D.C. public schools.
“Do you want to read the back cover?”
“No, thanks. I want to read this.”
“Oh, I see. You like negativity,” he concluded and then mumbled, “Well, I’m better than you.”
Sierra Leon, D.C. public schools, Basra, I thought, formulating a new mantra.
“What school do you go to?” he asked, leaning over “The Secret.”
“I actually don’t feel comfortable saying. I’m sorry…”
“Oh, well. Whatever. I go to Columbia University,” he declared, pointing to a light blue t-shirt that read “COLUMBIA.”
At Atlantic Avenue, I got off and switched subway compartments. I had two stops to go and no more time for positivity.