• Author: Wodarski, Thomas
• Editor: Heinemann, Robert D.
• Newspaper: The Eastern Echo volume 1
• Page Number:
• Date: 12 Winter 1956
• Tags:
• poetry

THE VISITING ROOM

by THOMAS WODARSKI

The young and the old, the rich and the poor the lowest and the great, they entered through a steel-barred door, a door decreed by fate, to meet a father or a son, a husband or a friend, and though the months and years are long, this column never ends.

Some come in with sunny smiles, forgiveness on their lips, while some come in with scornful words that tear the heart to bits.

Upon this screen of human life, a picture is unreeled, that needs no censorship but God’s, whose judgment is concealed.

They sit beside a screen that’s crude, to greet the one they love, and in their nervousness they play, with handkerchief or glove.

Beneath a watchful eye they talk, for just a short brief spell, for rules are strict, very strict, on what they say or tell.

A mother comes with faltering steps, an angel in disguise ; forgiveness, love and sympathy, are written in her eyes.

No matter what the crime may be, the sentence or disgrace, for there she sees her little boy, with teardrops upon his face.

I’ve seen the faithful wife, with courage unsurpassed, and marvelled at the woman’s love, that through the ages lasts; no temper, snare, nor pomp or wealth, can lead her steps astray, her love for him whose name she bears, burns brighter day by day.

I’ve seen the weak and waiting wife, whose love failed at the test, just like a leaf upon the stream, she drifted like the rest.

But who is cynical enough, to judge her or condemn, for many a flower once fair and sweet, was soiled by acts of men.

And so they come and so they go, the father, mother or wife, all victims of an aching heart, from sin and worldly strife.

For he who sins and breaks a law, is not the one who pays, tis those he leaves behind alone, to wait through endless days.