Notice

A Poem by CLBombay

A poem

His family lived in what you call, “the ditch”
The north side of town no one wanted to be,
but could unfortunately see
who had the daughter with ripped jeans split to the thigh
who had the dog attached to the half torn off trailer park door
barking at the incessant yelling
from one of the angry moms asking where her damn son went

Everyone could see, because small towns had a way of
putting mansions next to rows of homes the size of your car
putting the kid with Jordans next to the kid with 3 year old Converse and dirty trip pants
putting high rollers next to train wrecks

Everyone could see
But no one would notice
that every day at 5:00 AM he walked out of his dented trailer
walked past the gated neighborhood
and unlocked the gas station on the corner
to work a 9 hour shift, hoping the money could help
pay activity fees at school for the kids.
Payments only those across the street voted on.

And every day at 5:35 AM he walked around the gas station.
And since the winter snow was burying higher than his own roof,
he made sure to clear as much as he could with the shovel with the crack in the middle,
thus giving him something to do when the quiet, dark sky kept away the onlookers of judgement.
Kept away only those who regularly saw him, but never noticed him.

On a Tuesday the snow that had been harder the night before;
the cold wind so rough that car doors were ripping open,
exposing rips on leather and the pathetic wailing coming from frozen engines.
He was late to the gas station, but nonetheless forced the shovel around the corner,
keeping his head down to push through the waves of piercing air.

And his shovel hit something that felt like a log buried in between the garbage cans and the back door.

And he looked through his inflicted vision to see a face through the snow
that had crystals caked onto his glowing face.
He frantically pushed the snow off of his glistening hair and discovered the body stiffly formed
with a thin blanket drenched in mud, the only thing on the body that hardly passed as helpful against a Northern winter.
He grunted, throwing the heavy icicle of a body onto his and held the heavy log of a frozen man as if pressing against it would keep it from falling back into the Narnia of doom.

He realized that in holding him, the almost-shattered body had just the amount of life in it to move its cold chest against his every few seconds. He dragged the body into the building as if it were a safe haven that was gifted from God.

In that moment, when onlookers were asleep, he saved the life of the guy helpless behind the garbage can.

As they only saw him
living in "the ditch,"
walking passed them in the same ripped jacket,
barely stocking his own car of a house,

he continued on. Unnoticed.