I Write Poetry
Poem
Even Jesus would pity the innocence of this lost man
the music of this homeless stranger pierced our souls.
Just as easily as the words of Socrates coaxes our thought.
The character in life's village of the damned, a dray horse silhouette on a wall of poverty, yet as vivid and moving a portrait as any statues or paintings of Caesar.
His fatuous mind and dead eyes stare past the architecture of the mission, past the welcoming arms of the nun, to search for windows of escape.
An idiot they say, with Beverly Hills breath, and hasn't he heard of clean?
Yet he is smart enough to see past the dense war in the streets, to the stars above a meadow covered in crystalline snow, and he can also hear beyond the muffled traffic and sirens to the gentle sound of a wren, and larks who take to wing.
He can feel too the woman he once held between his hands, like a cup of water so pure.
All this and he hasn't moved his feet from the pavement where he stands, four inches from the gutter, where the body of that man he shared a smoke with last week was taken away.
He's just a different kind of dancer through life, his steps not as refined, like the suit on the way to work , who would flag a cab.
He knows his daily dance is to gather wooden sticks, paper, food, and retreat to his cardboard cave and prepare for the cold night to come.
