I met a man named John yesterday.
He was a poet. And an artist. And an activist.
I was sitting on the patio at a fast food restaurant,
writing. He asked me if he could sit down, he wanted to enjoy the sun, and
share my table as it was the only spot free - I said ‘yes’. I noticed his
shirt, and his beard – flecked with colour. Both of them. One due to age, and
one with paint.
He shared with me that he had just moved into the area – he
had been living for six months in a motel in china town. Horrible, he said. No
way for anyone to live. Now, because his best friend had become pregnant and
moved in with her daughter’s father (different rooms, though), he was able to
live in her old apartment.
He asked me if he could share some of his poetry with me. I
said yes, and accepted the piece of paper he pulled out from his well worn
backpack. It had been folded twice, into four perfect sections.
He blinked rapidly. Two or three times for every one of my
own. It made him appear as though he was concentrating twice as hard as I was.
Maybe he was.
His white dress shirt had been altered. Sleeves removed. He
wore it with only 4 buttons done up. I noticed the paint on it, only after he
began to show me the collages he had worked on. Pulled from his backpack one
after another. Christy Turlington, Hilary Swank, kittens, and mountain men
grinning ear to ear were his main focal points in his art. Always with the
background filled in. Always with his signature somewhere in the space between
magazine cuttings. Always with the date. He spelt December like he was French –
‘decembre’. I didn’t ask him why.
He showed me a photo of his friend with her daughter – 6
hours after the daughter way born. He told me she was born on February 1st
– groundhog day. I speculated that groundhog day may be on the 2nd.
He looked at me, and after a split second responded with, ‘I like to think she
was born on groundhog day’.
We high fived 6 times. He offered me some of his fries. He
said since I was new in town, if I ever wanted a friend to have coffee with, I
should email him. He smiled frequently, and with generosity.
When I packed up to leave, he shook my hand. His last words
were, ‘I’ll see you around the neighborhood – to new friends’.
I took his poetry home, and read every word as soon as I sat
down.
“he sit in olden wheelchair glaring at 1930’s spviet
presidium and joe stalin.
Retired now from the flow of life and flux of writing from
wonder-muses,
Knows he’s been relegated to third string
propagandist/writer/poet/seer
Still, he’s got that lava molten lava in those ancient
experienced eyes
And that huge moustache a la Nietzsche, plus that volcanic
mind
In effect, he is telling stalin and hitler and Mussolini and
their cronies
To go to whatever kind of political/social hell…
In a cheap novella!!!”
John Alan Douglas March 2013.