advent journal: day of service

we made a deposit
at our local food bank
524 pounds of groceries
math doesn’t do much

for poetry, but here are
the numbers: they need
112,329 pounds of food
everyday – every day

we had eight ninth grade
boys who unloaded the
truck and then stood on
the scale together

one ton of teenager
who had brought half
their weight in food
hoping to be of help

the woman at the scale
answered their questions
balanced their hope with
the weight of the world

we went back to school
then home for the holidays
she stayed to wait for the
other 111,800 pounds

Peace,
Milton