Home From the Sea

By Garland Davis

The neon lights were flashin’

And the icy wind was blowin’

Water seeped into his shoes

As the drizzle turned to snow

His eyes were red, his hopes were dead

And his wine was runnin’ low

When the old sailor came home

From the sea

 

Tears fell on the sidewalk

As he stumbled in the street

Faces stopped to stare

But no one dared to speak

For his castle was a hallway

And the bottle his only friend

When the old sailor stumbled in

From the sea

 

Up the dark and dingy staircase

The old sailor made his way

His ragged peacoat around him

As upon his cot, he lay

And he wondered how it happened

How he ended up this way

Getting lost like a fool

Here away from the sea

 

As he lay there sleeping

A vision appeared

Upon his mantle shining

A face of one so dear

Who had loved him in the Asian spring

Of a long-forgotten year

When the flowers bloomed

In her garden by the sea

 

She touched his grizzled fingers

And called him by his name

And then he heard the joyful sound

Of children at their games

In an old house on a hillside

In some forgotten village

Where the river runs down

To the Western sea

 

With a hum and roar vehicles move

Through the cavern streets

And life goes on

For the city never sleeps

And to an old forgotten sailor

The dawn will come no more

For the old man has come home

From the sea