Another Poem

This is a prose version of what started out as a story from a script called TRIBES written back in the early 90’s. The script was changed into a short story (for a competition I entered, and didn’t win) and then changed again into this poem.

There is also an audio version of this available over on the Dead End Dramacasts section of Dead End Movie Forum along with the short story.

I hope you don’t hate it too much.

Angel Down


(Or; A Rather Long and Poorly Written Poem)

I met this vision earlier

On a shadow infested street

With pools of glistening teardrops

spreading at her feet.

I stopped and thought; “An Angel!”

(For the wings gave her away

With wingtips hacked unevenly

like a statue of shattered clay

Between sobs her huge wings fluttered

like a flock of birds in flight

a canopy of the improbable

nearly blocking out the night)

She stopped and peered up at me

with eyes both soft and dark

Her feathers fluttering furiously

as the sobs racked her heart

I sat on the sidewalk next to her

stealing glances at her face

as her sobs gave way to silent tears

then eventually she ceased

(the city was a ghost town

the night devoid of life

I wondered why I didn’t feel

the winter cutting like a knife)

The silence was unbearable

so I struggled for something to say

But why, I thought, would an Angel wish

to listen about my day?

Regardless, I started to talk

gibbering about this and that

trying to sound wise and clever

while knowing I’d fail at it

(profundity escaped me

as did anything containing wit

I spent my life an idiot

but I’d never gotten used to it)

there came a time when she spoke

her voice a chorus of whispers

“I have walked the world forever”

she said while wiping away her tears

“the madness and sadness of humankind

is so very clearly perceivable

but to those who live those lives

it all seems so inconceivable”

(For a moment I felt I stood

at crossroads my eye couldn’t see

unable to understand

and unable to believe)

“Walk with me” she said and rose

taking me by the hand

together we walked a while

through my familiar land

until at last I could not feel

the earth beneath my feet

and peering down I clearly

saw the rooftops and the streets

(realisation struck me

like the cut of a knife

no longer would I have

to worry about my life)

So as I rose into the sky

over the once familiar land

below me stood the sad eyed angel

who had led me by the hand

her wings fluttered hopelessly

pinning her to the ground

docked wingtips with no purchase

an angel definitely downed

“So this is it” I thought to myself

as I faded into the night sky

“eventually we leave the world

at some point we all die…”