Poetry

The Street-Dweller

 (or What he is not, not what he is)

He staggers – a Man – bent under the weight of society

                                                                                         ’s forgotten promises and abuse and

the hard, dark coat in which he keeps everything

                                                                               he owns and hides his tired broken body.

Unclean.  Unkempt.  The homeless man.

                                                                    Less what he is than what he isn’t.

Tired and hungry, a man made of shadows: only I can see him

                                                                                                     for what he really is.  I reach out

for the coffee that sits on the table before me as I watch him

                                                                                                through the window of the café

as I try to understand his unhappiness, his pennilessness:

                                                                                           to understand not what he is, but what he isn’t.

He is forgotten in the name of ignorance and fear

                                                                                 is both his worst curse and his greatest defence.

We use ‘the two-fingered-salute’ and ‘four-letter-words’:

                                                                                          these form the wall we build to protect

ourselves from understanding him and ‘his kind’, as we refer to

                                                                                                      what he isn’t, not what he is.

He unwalks – a Nonman – unstraight under the weight of society’s unremembered promises and unkindness and

the softless, unlight coat in which he nonloses everything he unlost and unexposes his unawake, nonfixed body.

Dirty.

           Scruffy.

                        The Street-Dweller.

                                                          What he is not, not what he is.