The Cold Within...

  The Cold Within

 

Six men trapped by circumstances
In bleak and bitter cold

Each one possessed a stick of wood
Or so the story told

Their dying fire in need of logs
The first man held his back
For of the faces around the fire
He noticed one man black

The next man looking across the way
Saw one not of his sect
So couldn't bring himself to give
The chopped wood which he kept

The third one sat in tattered clothes
He gave his coat a hitch
Why should his log be put to use
To warm the 'selfish rich'?

The rich man just sat quietly back
And thought of the wealth he had in store
And how to keep what he had earned
From the 'lazy, shiftless poor'

The black man's face bespoke revenge
As the fire passed from his sight
For all he saw in his stick of wood
Was a chance to spite the white

The last man of this forlorn group
Did naught except for gain
Giving only to those who gave
Was how he played the game

Their logs held tight in death's still hand
Was proof of human sin
They didn't die from the cold without
They died from the cold within