12/7/13

Toy Soldier

Somewhere a siren sounds
Lights flash from billboards
Intermittently illuminating the alley
The sound of people
Walking at holiday speed
A cat claws through the dumpster
And beside it he sits
A broken man
Beaten and abused by life
An emotional and spiritual defeat
Lingers in his eyes
Years of regret and bad choices
Emanate from him
The smell of some cheap whiskey
His daily eau de cologne
The vertical streaks on his face
Were last weeks tears
This week he's too dehydrated to cry
Some faded memory of a little boy
Dimly passes through his mind
The tattered toy soldier in his coat
Is for him
And the lights dim
And the world fades
And everything he's ever known or done
Means nothing
Compared to the value of that toy
It's his future
The last possible hope
Of his redemption
In the face of a plastic man
For him
And for him

P.Frias