Abraham C. Keller
| I am walking across the park | |
| rather dreamily | |
| thinking about I don't know what | |
| when suddenly I become aware | |
| of someone beside me. | |
| Very ancient looking tall and thin | |
| and I have no idea | |
| whether he came at me from opposite | |
| or from behind | |
| or from the side. | |
| But there he is looking at me | |
| with a bony expressionless face | |
| quite in contrast to his bright | |
| multicolored garments. | |
| Ever polite I venture | |
| a quiet Hello | |
| but instead of answering | |
| he points a skinny forefinger at a bench | |
| to which I obediently walk with him | |
| and on which we sit down. | |
| When I turn toward him | |
| he has to my surprise | |
| a large pad on his lap | |
| something I have not noticed before. | |
| And in his right hand a kind of thick crayon | |
| which looks to have about six colors | |
| the same colors as his clothes I say to myself. | |
| The pad on his lap is off-white | |
| and looks more like medieval parchment | |
| than modern paper. | |
| I say something like Well if I remember right | |
| but my neighbor says nothing. | |
| Instead he draws a design | |
| on the right half of the pad | |
| only three or four lines | |
| but it clearly suggests | |
| a gun. | |
| Not a rifle or revolver | |
| but something in between. | |
| Because the object is clear to me | |
| in spite of its abstract style I blurt out Good! | |
| But no answer from Mr. Silence. | |
| Next to the left he draws three or four lines | |
| which look like a bullet | |
| but when he adds a tail to it I see | |
| it must be a missile. | |
| Finally at the bottom of the sheet | |
| with five lines each | |
| I count them this time | |
| he draws something like two human bodies | |
| one in a strange mixture of green and purple | |
| the other something between red and gray. | |
| The two have very different looks | |
| male or female I cannot say | |
| the style being too abstract for that. | |
| Near the bodies he puts | |
| what looks like a pile of broken bricks | |
| and other debris. | |
| He points his finger at the two objects | |
| then at the pile of bricks | |
| and at the human-like figures | |
| which lie flat on their backs. | |
| Next having done something with the crayon. | |
| for I see no more sign of it | |
| he wipes his eyes with his fingers | |
| as though to wipe away tears | |
| and raises his two hands upwards | |
| the palms toward his face | |
| and his chin and eyes upward along them | |
| in what can only be a questioning attitude | |
| and looks at me with a glittering accusing eye. | |
| Utterly motionless he sits there | |
| seeming to wait for my answer | |
| while I gaze intently at the pad | |
| with its drawings. | |
| Soon the accusing look turns to anger | |
| and his face comes closer and closer to mine | |
| it becomes so frighteningly furious | |
| that I seek for an answer | |
| with a desperation that I have never felt before. | |
| What should I tell him What can I say | |
| Wait I shout in alarm | |
| trying in vain to move my head away from his. | |
| But his face comes ever closer and | |
| as it almost touches mine | |
| it suddenly disappears and my shout wakes me up | |
| with an immediate sense of relief | |
| but | |
| with a burdensome feeling that somehow | |
| sometime soon | |
| I must find an answer to his question. | |
(Origination date unknown. Poem discovered after death.)