TO MY BROTHER WITH LOVE

No one to take your little hand
When you were just a boy,
No one to hold you close and say,
“My son, my pride and joy”

No one to guide your little steps,
Each time they went astray,
No dad or mum to listen when
You knelt each night to pray.

No one to care enough to share,
Your triumphs, joys and fears,
No one to kiss you when you fell,
And dry away your tears.

Although you’ve grown into a man,
The little boy inside,
Is looking for the love that
As a child you never had.

So many roads now beckon,
With promises of peace,
Each one deceitfully beguiles,
Seduces and misleads.

You walk along blind alleys,
You bump into dead ends,
I sadly watch as you insist
That you are quite content.

Not blind yet have no vision,
Not deaf yet hear no song,
Not orphaned yet rejecting
The Church where you belong.

No matter where you wander,
Or how far you choose to roam,
With all my love I pray someday,
That Christ will lead you home.

MYRA D’SOUZA
29.8.99

MY BROTHER'S KEEPER

Lost in a world that is narrowed by self,
Uncaring, untouched by the pain,
Of brothers who seek to worship strange gods,
With unpronounceable names.

Although I have dined on manna each day,
And I’m fed on the Bread that gives life,
I miserly hoarded the grace I received
I’ve been just as callous as Dives.

Enthralled and inspired as I read the Word,
Secure in God’s promise to me,
Indifferent was I that my brothers knew not,
That they too were royalty.

What use are my lips if they have been sealed,
Refusing to share the Good News,
And the light I received ‘neath a bushel concealed,
Hiding God’s treasures from view?

I cannot claim I’ve encountered the Lord,
If my love is shallow and flawed
A Christian who fails to proclaim the Good News
Is just a fake and a fraud.

Myra D'Souza / 28.9.1999