I have been wearing a bracelet of green beads bought from a charity,
With a thin gray circular disc (a severe charm!) attached,
Upon which the word GROWTH in blunt font is raised.
And then, beneath that, what I assume to be
The symbol for GROWTH in the script of some dialect:
It looks like a roughly scratched “T,” somewhat like a dagger.
As I go throughout my day the circle brushes my wrist;
If it were sharper it could lightly cut the skin.
In odd moments I’ve shaken the beads and repositioned
The charm so it laid flat against the back of my hand,
As though I could absorb the sentiment.
It would be a little indulgent on its own,
But in the chaos of my current days I do it bemusedly.
Lately I have been thinking of how personalities encounter history
And are changed.  Does the person shape history or does history
Shape the person?  There has to be cosmic selection
At work for some—obviously Voltaire, for example, was made for the French, For the Enlightenment!  But time breaks over all of us
Totally.  Time shapes us interestingly.  The craziness and force
Of everything I’ve brushed up against lately has surprised me,
And worn me down somewhat.  
I was surprised, too, sliding on the bracelet for the first time,
when I saw the big green beads interrupted by
The charm's message.