04-29-2015, 10:49 PM
Nine in a line
Shot in the leg after lying,
he limps into the line, mumbling
something about dying old.
Four hundred new friends, for a bag
of clothes, flown eastward,
to another place in the line:
with regret, the second walks.
A toothpick thin wife and two kids:
she knows he's third in the line,
while the young ones think
he's in some business trip.
Number four sings like he means it;
he worked like he meant it, too,
'til things fell apart, and he found
that man cannot live by bread alone,
but by every word of the bank.
The fifth also was one of the lost,
but in the line, he was anointed:
now, he walks with staff in hand,
trying to calm his newfound flock.
How blind he was back then:
now, his vision is crystal clear,
and his canvas reflects,
like a quiet spring,
the pain of being number six.
He thought the bags had only rice,
but that's not what his 'friends' said,
when they were granted freedom
in exchange for dragging him to seventh place.
He was drowning in the stormy seas,
lost in the surf, blind to his plight,
and sick in his mind,
before he became number eight.
She was the only woman there:
like the third, she has two kids,
but no spouse; she wonders why
she's covered in blood,
but unlike the others, still breathing.
Shot in the leg after lying,
he limps into the line, mumbling
something about dying old.
Four hundred new friends, for a bag
of clothes, flown eastward,
to another place in the line:
with regret, the second walks.
A toothpick thin wife and two kids:
she knows he's third in the line,
while the young ones think
he's in some business trip.
Number four sings like he means it;
he worked like he meant it, too,
'til things fell apart, and he found
that man cannot live by bread alone,
but by every word of the bank.
The fifth also was one of the lost,
but in the line, he was anointed:
now, he walks with staff in hand,
trying to calm his newfound flock.
How blind he was back then:
now, his vision is crystal clear,
and his canvas reflects,
like a quiet spring,
the pain of being number six.
He thought the bags had only rice,
but that's not what his 'friends' said,
when they were granted freedom
in exchange for dragging him to seventh place.
He was drowning in the stormy seas,
lost in the surf, blind to his plight,
and sick in his mind,
before he became number eight.
She was the only woman there:
like the third, she has two kids,
but no spouse; she wonders why
she's covered in blood,
but unlike the others, still breathing.