There used to be a sad lonely man walking aimlessly through town

Every so often he would stop at a store window to look around

And he would pull his ripped jacket closer to him as the

Winter winds swirled and bit through his thin skin

*

He once watched as a beautiful young woman in a thick red coat

Swished past in a whiff of fine perfume

And walked in to the shop to spend money on things she didn't need

And he didn't understand the terrible unfairness of it all

*

He walked further down the road to spend his carefully saved quarter

On the daily paper and he opened it to the employment pages

And he walked to a house to ask for a job so he could climb out of this hole

And the family heard his story and then it was back on the street for him

*

He spent another dreamless hopeless night

Crying in despair and there was no-one to answer his pleas

Though he struggled and cried it was in vain

He was being lowered into this hole in the ground and sprinkled with the sand of poverty

*

Another day passed and he was as close to breaking free

As he was six months and a year before

He slept again on a cold metal bench covered by soggy leaves

And found himself in the morning covered with snow

*

He was giving up, slipping away

18 months he had suffered inhumanely

He had no more trust in the human race

And feverishly he sat starving and praying

*

One day he was ill with the disease of hunger

He sat outside the closest restaraunt and watched

People coming and going with warm plates of greasy food

Laughing, talking, and having the time of their lives

*

He had given up, let go of any shot at a better life

He had forgotten the feeling of comfort and happiness

He could no longer remember when he hadn't wished he would die and end it all

Now his days were all spent in hunger and misery

*

Then he sat on his bench and didn't even move

He didn't have the strength to get up and beg again

People crossed to the other side of the road to get away from him

And wrinkled their noses in utter disgust as they walked away

*

That night he slipped into a better world

Free of poverty and starvation and cold metal benches

And as dawn rolled around his body was shoveled into an incinerator

And nobody knew he was gone

Or even that he ever came.