#jasonsimpson

The crashing of waves

Broke against the shores of his conscious

As he pressed a shell to his ear.

  The poet lived

On the narrow street

Between the old ruins if his previous life,

A tower if creative excellence,

And the dark alleyway of depression

That so often played the part of his pillow.

  Many a night,

When the cold bit at his skin,

When his already nervous fingers

Trembled with the bitterness of the winter faces

That looked down upon him

From inside fire heated windows.

It was then

He sought refuge in the comforting embrace

Of dirty brick walls,

And an almost too dirty coat

That wrapped more tightly around his thinning frame

Then it ever had before.

  Many a night

He had kindled imaginative magic

On the same papers

That had kindled the fires

Which kept him warm enough to shiver.

  And still he held that shell

Was pressed against his ear,

And the waves crashed onto the shores of his conscious

As he listened

With a face that he would call a smile,

And others would describe as ugly

Because they saw the wrinkles, dirt and grime instead.

The same way they saw the wrinkles, dirt and grime

On the pages he wrote on,

And not the words and rhymes or the statements he spoke of.

  He rummaged through the trash

Of the living rich,

Looking for scraps of left-over attention

To nourish himself

With the only sustenance

A starving poet required,

Recognition.

  And the rhythms of his heart

Coursed through his veins,

Out of his pen,

And onto the page

In every stanza

Every sentence and every clause.

  Because his cause

Were the thoughts that formed storms

And forced themselves onto all four corners

Of every page,

Door,

Wall,

floor board,

door,

and drawer of a house that was so dilapidated

that it would take the vision of a man who had nothing,

but himself on a cold winter night,

to call it warm.

  He pulled a parchment of paper

From a pocket that contained nothing

But the memories of the warmth

His empty hands occasionally searched for.

The words,

Written in shivering hand-writing,

On a night much like that one,

Were themselves huddled on the page

Seeking comfort and protection together.

  He unfolded the paper that was more weathered and wrinkled

From overwork

Than he was,

He took a breath and began to read;

Each scene ever perceived

Through his deep brown eyes,

Repeated eloquently with ease

As his soul began to bleed.

  These words

Were his attempt at making peace

With a world that stopped at nothing to impede his dreams.

And as he spoke,

As he preached his speech

To an audience of hanging dust particles

Glinting as they reflected light from the lamp on the side-walk street,

He reached into himself and began to weep,

"I have lived a life

Likened to that of maggots.

Licking my lips at the smell of rat left-overs,

Lapping up the stagnant liquid

Frome each sleeve,

Where snow has melted into the fabric

Allowing me to breath another day."

  He crumpled the paper

As he slumped to the floor

With his back against the wall.

He fondled around for the shell he had dropped,

As he closed his eyes ,

Tears streaming as he defied

Each noose hold

And scythe that dug a little deeper into his life

Every moon lit sky.

He picked up that shell

And pressed it to his ear.

  The crashing of waves

Broke against the shores

Of his conscious in an instant.

Not the waves of liquid meeting land

On a beach he had never visited,

But the waves of applause

For a piece he'd performed

To a crowed that had never listened.

  And as he sat, he smiled.

And.

Fell asleep to the roar of that same crowed