The Check-Out King
       

He died in his mid-twenties
(nobody seemed to know what of),
got himself safely underground
before the rest of us had our first cancer scare.
He was always slipping past the lens,
over at the cropped edge of the class picture
or dead centre in an egg of glare.
He might be at the vortex of a scrum or rumble
or flopped down in the field beyond the goal,
oblivious to calls for his return, watching
(perhaps) an ant traverse a blade of grass.
In those days no work meant you failed.
"Have you finished, Earl?" the teacher
asked when his head sank onto his arms.
"No." "Have you started?" "No."
Everyone, even she, laughed. Everyone
except Earl. He rode out humour
the way a pine tree rides out rain.
A cipher makes a tricky victim:
he may become a black hole or a mirror.
Our bully picked him out only when
he'd run through everyone else at least twice.
Earl didn't confront, didn't retreat.
He stood there and one punch knocked him flat.
He lay a while with his face to the sky
(so long that some of us
looked up too—just blue and fluffy clouds)
and then got up and walked away
toward wherever he lived, getting
slowly small, every few steps
bringing a hand to his face and
flinging a ribbon of blood at the dust.

Tweet

Copyright © 2020 Mike Barnes All rights reserved
from Braille Rainbow
Biblioasis
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission