Chase'n Paris

 

Decaying around the television

It is there, at the side, yet in the center,

Present in our life only by choice, destroying our life only by choice,

Stains outline it, vomit, a drunken frenzy.

Next to the window, a thin grey pram,

Fabric interwoven with cigarette ashes,

Milk and baby food, pure white, purely dark,

Spilled in the attempt to feed a restless child,

Miserable, flailing, a broken mirror laid in a corner,

Reflection of his life, without a voice, feeble.

After working skillful trades,

A sudden rage throwing a beer bottle, at contact the glass is shattered, the screen is fractured,

A shout, “the telly!!!”

In a desperate rush, now Feeble is pushed aside, a flimsy second-hand wooden high chair,

Falling in slow motion,

Strapped down, a prisoner, fragile face against solid ground, a broken tooth, untended, passive.

The buckle, cheap Chinese plastic,

Snaps, Sharp and toothy, feeble runs, crawling and clawing away.

The sun, a translucent yellowish red,

Shining eerily on the chaos,

The wallpaper pealing,

The plaster yellowing, browning,

The heat scorching, the walls sweating,

Leaking an assortment of excrement and urine,

Unseen, unattended,

Decaying.

Scurrying away, Feeble, on the floor,

Pushes an innocent palm on a cold rusting nail protruding from the floor board,

Yelling now,

Unnoticed always,

Perseverant, onward, in the hall, the heavily holed carpet, stained, vomit, alcohol, ashes,

A drop or two of blood, memory of an idealistic love,

Out the dog flap, decaying yellow plastic, wet and muddy,

OUT NOW!

Perseverant strides, four legged, through the untended garden, dry, dead, un-green,

Juddering like a small impatient train on rugged tracks.

The sun revealing, formidable, glaring at decaying house after decaying house,

At the edge of the driveway now, near the road.

The whoosh of a car,

The blurring of it's thick lights,

A strike of red!

A splatter of blood!

It had hit a pigeon.

The sun was still in the sky, close to the ground,

By the time it had gone down, Brave would be free,

And when it rose, maybe, just maybe, he would survive.