Begging for a Seat in School - Neutral Morality in Disguise

 Begging for a Seat in School - Neutral Morality in Disguise

"He who feels for the needy

   with but some coins is a fool,

   in a world deaf to a poor boy 

            begging for a seat in school." - avr

Dr Abe V Rotor

It pains me so much - personally and as a part of humanity - 

to see a boy beggar in rags, or incognito walking with us, 

or abandoned in some dingy corner, when the world proudly 

proclaims, "never in history has Homo sapiens, the thinking, 

reasoning man, reached the pinnacle of progress way, way 

above the banner of enlightenment." 

Wrong. I still feel guilty seeing the likes of this young beggar.  

millions of them around the world - in rich and poor countries,

industrialized and agricultural, for this is not a matter of mercy,

not even compassion - or neutral morality.  Words come easy, 

mother statements as universal truth, prayers are empty still.~  

  

 

An Iranian student of mine at the UST Graduate School c. 1996 gave me this almost worn out reproduction meticulously wrapped in plastic as a souvenir and as an expression of gratitude to me as his professor in natural science. "I carried this with me," he said, "as a source of challenge with the hope that I will succeed in my studies - and to be of help later to children like this boy.  Now I am going back to my country."  

I was speechless. I examined the painting.  There is no name - title and artist, or any note for that matter. A good follower of this blog mentioned the painter artist in passing - for which I am grateful to him. The painter, based on his style and subject apparently belonged to the post classicism era at the dawn of realism, when art began to transcend to the people, which we know today as people's art."*

A disturbing scene to Maslow -

    could he have been wrong?

What is self-actualization

    to the striving throng?

What's good is the Bastille trilogy -

    pillars of modern society:

equality, fraternity,

    liberty - sans dignity?

Motherhood words may come easy;

    they cannot be mistaken,

for the lips that speak of promise

    are easily forgotten.

And the world goes on as it seems;

    a beggar boy, its conscience:

lost youth, lost hope, lost future

    in the midst of affluence.

The door is jarred to full view

    and knocking wouldn't lend an ear;

indifference makes man blind

    or takes him to the rear.

He who feels for the needy

    with but some coins is a fool,

in a world deaf to a poor boy

    begging for a seat in school. ~

  

 Typical scenes in marginalized societies mainly in metropolitan suburbs. 

(Internet photos) ~

"Please sir I want some more" - from Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens 

 Acknowledgement: Pinterest

* Nikolay Petrovich Bogdalov-Belsky (1868–1945) was a Russian painter.