strange, like nothing my life, my street sense,
my sly tongue had ever prepared me for. Hush, child.
Hush now, and I will tell you. Even before the dawn
one Friday morning I noticed a young man, handsome
and strong, walking the alleys of our City. He was pulling
an old cart filled with clothes both bright and new, and
he was calling in a clear tenor voice; "Rags!" (Ah, the air
was foul and the first light filthy to be crossed by such sweet music.) "Rags! New rags for old! I take your
tired rags! Rags!"
"Now, this is a wonder," I thought to myself, for the
man stood six-feet-four, and his arms were like tree
limbs, hard and muscular, and his eyes flashed
intelligence. Could he find no better job than this, to be
a ragman in the inner city? I followed him. My curiosity
drove me. And I wasn't disappointed. Soon the Ragman
saw a woman sitting on her back porch. She was sobbing
into a hankerchief, sighing and shedding a thousand
tears. Her knees and elbows made a sad X. Her
shoulders shook. Her heart was breaking. The Ragman
stopped his cart. Quietly, he walked to the woman,
stepping around tin cans, dead toys, and pampers.
"Give me your rag," he said so gently, "and I'll give you
another." He slipped the handkerchief from her eyes.
She looked up, and he laid across her palm a linen cloth
so clean that it shined. She blinked from the gift to the
giver. Then as he began to pull his cart again, the
Ragman did a strange thing: he put her stained
handkerchief to his own face; and the HE began to weep,
to sob as grievously as she had done, his shoulders
shaking. Yet! she was left without a tear.
"This IS wonderful," I breathed to myself, and I
followed the sobbing Ragman like a child who cannot turn
away from mystery. "Rags! Rags! New rags for old!" In
a little while, when the sky showed grey behind rooftops
and I could see the shredded curtains out black
windows, the Ragman came upon a girl whose head was
wrapped in a bandage, whose eyes were empty. Blood
soaked her bandage. A single line of blood ran down
her cheek. Now the tall Ragman looked upon this child
with pity, and he drew a lovely yellow bonnet from his
cart. "Give me your your rag," he said tracing his own
line on her cheek, "and I'll give you mine." The child
could only gaze at him while he loosened the bandage,
removed it, and tied it to his own head. The bonnet he
set on hers. And I gasped at what I saw: for with the
bandage went the wound! Against his brow it ran darker,
more substantial blood - his own! "Rags! Rags! I take
old rags!" cried the sobbing, bleeding, strong intelligent
Ragman. The sun hurt both the sky, now, and my eyes;
the Ragman seemed more and more to hurry.
"Are you going to work?" he asked a man who leaned
against a telephone pole. The man shook his head.
The Ragman pressed him: "Do you have a job?" "Are
you crazy?" sneered the other. He pulled away from the
pole, revealing the right sleeve of his jacket - flat, the
cuff stuffed into the pocket. He had no arm. "So," said
the Ragman. "Give me your jacket, and I'll give you
mine." Such quiet authority in his voice! The one-armed
man took off his jacket. So did the Ragman - and I
trembled at what I saw: for the Ragman's arm stayed in
the sleeve, and when the other put it on he had two good
arms, thick as tree limbs; but the Ragman had only one.
"Go to work," he said.
After that he found a drunk, lying unconscious beneath
an army blanket, an old man, hunched, wizen, and sick.
He took that blanket and wrapped it round himself, but
for the drunk he left new clothes. And now I had to run
to keep up with the Ragman. Though he was weeping
uncontrollably, and bleeding freely at the forehead,
pulling his cart with one arm, stumbling for drunkedness,
falling again and again, exhausted, old, old, and sick,
yet he went with terrible speed. On spider's legs he
skittered through the alleys of the City, this mile and
the next, until he came to it's limits, and then he rushed
beyond. I wept to see the change in this man. I hurt to
see his sorrow. And yet I needed to see where he was
going in such haste, perhaps to know what drove him so.
The little old Ragman - he came to a landfill. He came to
the garbage pits. And then I wanted to help him in what
he did, but I hung back, hiding. He climbed a hill. With
tormented labor he cleared a little space on that hill.
Then he sighed. He lay down. He pillowed his head on
a handkerchief and a jacket. He covered his bones with
an army blanket. And he died. Oh, how I cried to
witness that death! I slumped in a junked car and wailed
and mourned as one who has no hope - because I had
come to love the Ragman. Every other face had faded in
the wonder of this man, and I cherished him; but he
died. I sobbed myself to sleep. I did not know - how
could I know? that I slept through Friday night and
Saturday and it's night too.
But then on Sunday morning I was awakened by a
violence. Light - pure, hard demanding light - slammed
against my sour face, and I blinked, and I looked, and I
saw the last and the first wonder of all. There was the
Ragman folding the blanket most carefully, a scar on his
forehead, but Alive! and besides that, healthy! There
was no sign of sorrow, nor of age, and all the rags that
he had gathered shined for cleaniness. Well, then I
lowered my head and trembling for all that I had seen,
I myself walked up to the Ragman. I told him my name
with shame, for I was a sorry figure next to him. Then
I took off my clothes in that place, and I said to him
with dear yearning in my voice: "Dress me." He dressed
me. My Lord, he put new rags on me, and I am a wonder
beside him. The Ragman, The Ragman, The CHRIST!
From "Ragman and Other Cries of Faith"
