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Page 12
Poetry
Street Roots • July 14-20, 2017
Lemonade and Circus Toys
by Jack Davis
In a crowded skid row doorway,
Wondering if there might be some way
He could make it through the drizzling rain until the gray of dawn.
Sometimes he’d been better;
Sometimes he’d been wetter;
So, all in all, where he was at was just where he was at.
Last evening he’d been sorta fed
While some preacher sorta read
A message almost as thin as his lukewarm soup.
He remembers a 5-year old’s joys:
Lemonade and circus toys
In the backyard of his long ago childhood Memphis home.
Then daddy drank up their last penny,
And when he died mommy hadn’t any.
So at the age of 12, he and mommy hit the road.
Hitching west out towards L.A.,
“We’ll smell the sea,” he heard mommy say.
But at the trailer park all he could smell was the pumping oil.
Mommy went from a cafe waitress
To earning her living on a mattress,
And learned to change the act of love into an act of spite.
The boy learned his dark lessons too,
And when his mommy’s life was through,
He lit out on his own road at not-so-sweet 16.
He ended up in Oregon
Where summer’s short and rain is long,
And lived a life without much hope or brighter than today.
With one hand on the bottle,
In the other life’s full throttle,
He quickly learned why the shelters were completely filled each night,
Just past turning 30
But looking like he’s 50,
Through drink and dope he’s come to question why he was still alive.
He thought it kind of strange and odd
The preachers’ preaching, “Turn to God!”
Instead of the Creator turning 'round to be with him.
He found later on that night
While stumbling toward the brilliant light
That the road to your Creator can be a busy two-way street.
Now the hard times and the vacant stare
Are just a part of Earthly fare,
When the rock-hard world has been left trailing far behind.
He feels his new life will surely fit
As he becomes a part of it.
He’s found eternal gracious good and the “Now” of Creator’s love.
No past regrets or future sorrow,
No yesterday and no tomorrow,
With the innocence of lemonade and shiny circus toys.
LA U G H IN G P LA N E T.C O M