Six humans trapped by happenstance
In black and bitter cold
Each one possesed a stick of wood,
Or so the story's told.

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

The next man looking cross the way
Saw not one of his church,
He couldn't bring himself to give
The fire his stick of birch.

The third one sat in tattered clothes
His coat he gave a hitch,
Why should his log be put to use
To warm the idle rich?

The rich sat 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.

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

The logs held tight in Death's still hands
Was proof of human sin.
They didn't die from the cold without.
They died from the cold within.

- Unknown author

Contributed by Doris Collins

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