Old Homeless Man
by Walter William Safar
I am looking at the funerary procession
like a thief,
like I’m afraid someone might notice my gaze,
I should be down there, along with that silent little procession,
but I am treacherously hiding from their eyes
and their poverty.
Their dry, wrinkled, gray faces look so damn much
like the old wooden crosses of the nameless cemetery,
so much that even the crows have found their homes on their heads,
and the clothes, full of patches, mud and dried blood
speaks tomes of their class
if homeless people can be called a class at all.
I am looking at the funerary procession and their trembling,
cracked thin hands,
carrying an old homeless man in a humble and quickly made coffin,
an old homeless man whose lifeless eyes
are looking for my living eyes,
and I am stealing the silky treads of the old spider,
trapping my own spirit,
as if my spirit was but a simple fly
instead of a lighthouse of conscience.
While darkness surrounds the funerary procession
(wealthy people say that poor people do not need light,
since everything in their lives is black anyway),
the wind is stealing rays of light from the luxurious and wealthy 42nd street,
gildening the dark street of my childhood,
but the strangest thing in this game of light and dark,
hope and hopelessness,
is the dignity of the funerary procession
that produly and honorably bids the old homeless man farewell,
as if he was the gateskeeper of heaven and he shall await them up there
like genuine members of the noble progeny of angels,
and I am still escaping the lifeless gaze of the old homeless man,
I have just betrayed the old homeless man, that nice guy,
this torch-bearer, this minister of words,
I have just betrayed my brother in arms,
I have just betrayed our old poet.
Copyright ©: Walter William Safar
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The End
And that’s the End of the Poem
© Poetry Monster, 2021.
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