It doesn't have to be a global. I like the closure solution:

use strict;
use File::Find;

print "starting a find \n";
print join("\n", myfind('.')) . "\n";


sub myfind
{
  my $dir = shift;
  my $list = [];
  find({wanted=>sub{findcb($list)}}, $dir);
  return((wantarray)?(@$list):($list));
}

sub findcb
{
  my $listref = shift;
  push @$listref, $File::Find::name;
}
[download]

This is a closure right?