an invocation for Green Tara

I was not born
with the mothering

bone, so it’s not
the young woman

my own age
on the 48 bus

hoisting her off-
spring aloft

who trains my attention,
or catches my heart

but the face of the disabled
man withered in the wheelchair

strapped down to the coach,
his eyes grown wide watching

jaw gone slack until
drool spills out the corners

of his mouth, crying out
in a language that none

of us will recognize but
which we all comprehend