A Poem to Start the Week: The Unseen

This poem is by Ralph Noble, a friend who 50 years ago did his student-teaching in my classroom at McHenry Elementary. Ralph gave his permission to share this. I copied the words from his Facebook page and took the liberty of arranging them in InDesign and then pasting them here.

The Unseen

I don’t see the hands, 

   but they picked the strawberries 

   I drooled over for dessert 

You can’t see the hands, 

   but they lifted your father from 

   his nursing home bed to clean him

I didn’t see the hands, 

   but they cleaned the hotel room 

   that I stayed in last night for $250

We didn’t see the hands, 

   but they washed the dishes from 

   our fabulous $200 dinner

We don’t see their faces. 

   They are behind masks.

We don’t see their names. 

   They are taped over and hidden from sight.

We don’t know which agency they work for, 

   it is classified.

They come armed. They come in mass

The unseen faces take away the unseen hands 

   to unknown places, out of sight. Gone. 

Gone from the fields

Gone from the nursing homes

Gone from the hotels

Gone from the restaurants

Gone from their families and friends

Gone from us

Gone

- by Ralph Noble