“The Next One Will Help”

″Poor Man” the old lady thought walking down the street, her gaze fixed upon the elderly man hunched over on the sidewalk. Yet as she passed him, she said not a word, and continued on her way. He was dirty, clothes in tatters, with nothing but a thin blanket to shield him from the harsh city weather. He was alone, with nobody but himself. In an earlier life he had friends that would save him in an instant from his condition, but they were all gone to the next world, and so here he sat. Every day he sat there, hoping a stranger would see his plight, and offer some assistance. But day after day nobody stopped, most of them thinking ”The next man will surely help him” and continuing on their priveldged way. For the old man, every person he saw made his eyes glimmer with hope, only to be crushed as they passed him by, without hesitation. But the old man held onto hope-even if it was hanging by a thread, he faithfully hung onto it. But winter soon approached, and as the days grew colder, the fibers of the thread began to loosen and break. Once, a long time ago, the old man had been a great soldier, fighting valiently for his country, the same country, the same people who now passed him on the street without a second thought. As the day drew to a close, and more people passed him, he figured he had better find shelter. So he walked, not too far, and there he found a tree, and layed down under its great oak branches. His eyes began to droop, and soon he was fast asleep.

″Poor man” thought the police officer the next morning, as he watched the old man being lifted into the large white vehicle; the old man had finally gone to join his friends in the next world, and he quickly became another number, another statistic. He wouldnt be mentioned in the newspapers the next morning, he would simply be forgotten.