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 Brian enters the dining room escorted by a 12-year-old boy. Everyone recognizes Brian. The young child is severely out of place.  There are Six of us total, including staff, and the animated boy's eyes seem intent to say something to us all.  He slips his hand from Brian's and rushes towards me where I'm sitting down, and as I turn from my plate the boy arrogantly demands some of my food.  "You can't do that," one of the other patients informs him. "Even Richard has certain rights." "Inalienable," adds another gentleman to my right.  The boy is clearly offended by this, but marches away in an effort of stoic reclamation. And I return to my food.  He swiftly switches to the next table, where Alberto sits by himself. When the boy reaches a hand towards Alberto's face, Alberto gently leans from his path, tolerant but disinterested. The boy says, "Can I help you?" Alberto says No without hurry. His ancestry dwells half-defeated i...

 Stop me if you've heard this one:  He wakes up with nothing internally out of place. Dis-  comfort casts no shadow in his person and the world is  tranquil and accommodating except that it is a forest  and not a city nor a house.  The sound of birds and rodents and larger beasts has  replaced traffic and modern infrastructure one could  associate with traffic, with the ingenuity of Man.  When he turns his head the disquieting outline appears:  the four legs, the elegant throat chest muzzle, the wild  antlers. And self-recognition can no longer be suppressed. The animal, the new him, despondently but willingly, lifts  the rock-hard hoof and leg and begins toward the  virgin forest, the soft, papertowel leaves canvasing the  world of the dead.  He tries to remember his name, as though that title should  return something that fled in his sleep: But in the space  where the name would righteously be printed...

 The Gravity of self-pity swirls  in his medication-soaked eyes,  and he rolls on his haunches,  consumed in hopeless  yearning.  The years too many to merit  counting, excuse after excuse  contributing to a hideous manhood,  Andy wanders like a forsaken  teddy bear, cross-eyed and dreaming  of a way back home.  He tugs at every stranger's sleeve,  unsure if they can make it stop.  *** 

 This woman pulls up in an SUV  to the parking lot behind  the parking garage  where a mostly-unvaried  number of us get drunk  and smoke joints  to chase away the boredom  of not trying harder,  or the inevitable difficulties  of trying harder.  She is not the only person  in Poughkeepsie  to do something like this.  But where others would  offer us services for rehabilitation  or to pass the word along concerning  free clothing or homecooked meals  when and where, this woman  has made the effort to carefully  memorize the history of another's  physical deterioration, and how it  led, through faith and prayer, to her  witnessing  the awesome healing power  of our city's best friend: Jesus.  So...while the others  I share beer and pot and vodka with  sat demurely tolerating this person,  I took it for as long as I could  before picking up ...