So I turned around again. As if the giving of a donation entitled me to do so, I stopped beside a nearby car and observed. I challenged myself to see him. I would stay here until I saw more than a sightless indigent on a busy thoroughfare in downtown Rio de Janeiro. I watched him sing.
Some beggars grovel in a corner cultivating pity.
Others unshamedly lay their children on blankets in the middle of the sidewalk thinking that only the hardest of hearts would ignore a dirty, naked infant asking for bread. But this man did none of that. He stood tall. And he sang. All of us had more reason to sing than he, but he was the one singing.