In the Long
Run – The Long Run Home
by
Murray Andrews
Here’s to a man
with a common name,
And deeds not so common you see,
For he embarked on a journey,
When adventure did call,
That same thing that calls you and me.
True to the cloth of his
spirit’s dream,
And a scooter named Melawend,
He captured a nation’s imagination.
Like flint his face set in the wind.
If Tom only knew it was
I
Who sat on his motorized steed.
And it was I who slept out at night,
Beneath strange stars clear and bright,
To satisfy some long lost need.
Within the haunted
hollows of his heart,
I found myself living there.
It was I who kissed the pretty girls,
And lost my senses in their perfumed hair.
In the long run, an
odyssey
For me in my wheelchair -
Hope almost gone and ambition dead,
I got caught up in Tom Smith’s lair.
He brought the world
together for me,
And placed it in my small room.
And as I lost myself in Tom’s adventures,
Little shoots from my heart did bloom.
So I stood me up and
took me a step
From that old lone prison wheelchair.
And me legs did shake and quiver some.
I kept imagining Melawend – and I was there!
When the pain hit I
lifted my heart,
And felt the powerful force of a wind.
And I stepped clear out of my body there,
As I straddled old Melawend.
And Tom gave a cheer
from a place inside me,
Where giants and heroes once again came to live.
And I was healthy and free as a bird in flight,
As Melawend gave me all she could give.
So, this poem’s for
a man and his readers who come
To read and live anew,
And get caught up by a silly old scooter,
And ride off on dreams come true.
For people like me we
just waste away,
And wear out those who care.
Broken in spirit, body, and mind,
We are bound to a mental wheel chair.
That is, until
people like Tom,
Perhaps trying to outrun their own pain,
Get a wild hair to brave the world,
And bring people like me home to love again.
© 2004
Murray Andrews (ThePoetsKiss) All rights reserved.