My Not So Safe Bench in The Dark (Poem)

 My Not So Safe Bench in The Dark
David S Nicholson
Oct 05, 2020

Sitting, in a not so safe place, watching the shadows created by streetlights dance.

The never-ending sound of cars moving, often to quickly into the night.

The wind ever moving like a memory that just will not come to the front of your mind.

A vague glimpse of the just past full moon as the clouds render it invisible once again.

I can hear my heart thumping, as the people of the night moving about, all too loudly for 1 am.

Why have I ever come to be in this spot, on a bench, in a park, where no one will see what happens if it does.

A face moves toward me and motions his dead toward the bushes, “No thanks I say”, and he melts into the dark.

A glint of light catches me eye, just on the edge of vision is a small glass pipe that has been well used, and perhaps a shoe.

It is not fear of the night, nor its people that makes my heart race; it is the fear of tomorrow and the days after it.

The cold air is starting to make my joints stiff and my muscles ache; yet this is a welcoming feeling somehow.

I smell a sweet smell and cannot see what it belongs to.

I hear foot falls and again see no one at all.

They move around me and I am alone on my cold bench moving farther into the night.

I think first that it would not be appropriate to drink a beer here, then think what would not be appropriate in this dark place?

A leaf falls on my, reminding me how close to winter I have become.

I push on the bench with my hands and my knee cracks as I stand to walk home.

A cat walks close to me and pauses to look then moves off.

I think “what kind of bird is singing now”?

I walk home and climb into my bed spent from life and not from activity.

I hope I can sleep, that is, if my thoughts will allow it.

Tomorrow and Tomorrow, and perhaps not many more, but I will have my not so safe bench in the park, in the dark.