and the laptop computer I saved
three paychecks for, filled with poems
and stories I wrote in my spare time
from slaving at that menial job I have
that barely pays the bills
and keeps food in my refrigerator.
I would've loved to read him
a few of my poems. They would've
really knocked his socks off.
And I would've told him
of my dream of being a famous poet,
like my idols, Allen Ginsberg, Charles Bukowski,
Amiri Baraka, T. S. Eliot, Billy Collins,
of being published,
of Garrison Keillor reading
one of my poems on his radio show,
and of one day
not-so-many years in the future,
sitting on a stage in an auditorium
of an Ivy-league university,
one that working class parents
dream of sending their kids to
if they could afford it,
next to all my poetry idols
reading their work,
and of Billy Collins patting me
on the shoulder like a baseball coach
before a player goes up to bat,
saying to me, smiling,
"You're up, kid."
No, this man on the podium
in his cheap suit and tie
doesn't know me. He doesn't
know me at all.
He doesn't speak for me.
He speaks for the people who are
so used to hearing people like him speak
that they forgot how to speak for themselves,
or how to think,
or the most important trait
of human existence,
how to dream.
THE LITTLE ONE
The little one and I
sit together on the couch,
engrossed in the pages
of the latest Thomas the Train
adventure thriller.
At the precise moment
where our hero must latch onto
Percy's derailed car
in a blinding storm, ready to
risk it all to rescue his dear friend
from a sinking demise
in the mud,
the little one rips the book
from my hands, throws it on the floor,
squats and begins turning
the pages himself.
And I can't help but wonder,
could he be an impatient learner,
or a newborn seeker
of a truth not yet realized.
Only time will tell.
ELEGY FOR A STAR
for Heath Ledger
I saw a star go out last night.
It used to be one of the brightest
in the heavens. But it's brilliant light
grew dimmer with each passing night
until it was no more.
I wonder what made that star
go out. They're supposed to last longer
than the people who gaze upon them.
But not this star.
Maybe it was sad.
Maybe it was lonely.
Maybe we didn't give it enough love.
Maybe stars are like flowers
in the sun, their very lives
dependent upon the love and care
we give them.
I feel responsible.
ANOTHER SATURDAY NIGHT
Another Saturday night alone
in my apartment,
dressed in my after-shower costume
of T-shirt and sweat pants,
sitting on my couch
pigging out on triscuits,
another classic movie on PBS,
pad and pen on my coffee table
with scribblings leading my thoughts
to another new poem,
next to the latest rejection slip
from Poetry magazine
telling me in the kindest language
not to give up my day job,
while out there
in the bars and clubs of
the world, my friends
are having the time of their lives,
drinking, listening to music,
enjoying each other's
good company.
"You're gonna die alone,"
they warn me.
"A miserable old bard
with no one to bury you."
"Maybe so," I reply.
"But what have you written lately?"
FEARING TOMORROW
Tomorrow is
just around the corner.
And for the first time in my life
I'm afraid of what's coming.
I'm afraid like the ordinary man
in old Israel was afraid
when a young rabbi named Jesus
came along starting all that trouble.
I'm afraid like the ordinary man
in South Carolina was afraid
when it seceded from the Union
and kindled the fires
of the Civil War.
I'm afraid like the ordinary men
in old Russia, old China and old Cuba
were afraid when their neighbors
chose communism to be their savior.
I'm afraid like the ordinary man
was afraid forty years ago,
when a black minister named Martin
and a white yankee named Bobby
knocked down the walls between us
with a sledgehammer, preaching
justice and equality for all.
I'm the next ordinary man
who's afraid.
I'm afraid of the hopes and dreams
of so many becoming
a nightmare for us all.
I'm afraid of my brothers, my sisters
and my friends becoming my enemies
for having a different point of view.
I'm afraid of having the change
force-fed down my throat
when I need time to swallow it.
I don't think people are ready
for tomorrow yet.
Least of all me.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Some of these poems appeared in the following magazines: Ceremony, A Journal of Poetry and Other Arts, Pablo Lennis, and WritingRaw.com.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
George I. Anderson lives in southern New Jersey. The Pedestrian is his first book of poems.
The Pedestrian and Other Poems Page 2