-- Feeling Low --

John Herlihy

The streets don’t seem to know me,

I am only a stranger in their midst.

The streetlights don’t glow within me,

Instead, they just vanish inside the mist.

Everyone knows the feeling of being low,

Patience my only friend as I wait the hour.

She had promised to come, but still I know,

I sit at the cafe alone, outside a rain shower.

The day moves forward, but doesn’t hold me,

The minutes becomes hours difficult to face.

How sweet the night that doesn’t embrace me,

The darkness as lengthening shadows on my face.

The floor has fallen out, with no bottom in sight,

The echo of falling debris reverberates far too long.

We are in free-fall, disappearing far out of sight,

The melancholy notes of a piano result in a sad song.

Crawling through the bottom grass feeling no pain,

Lost amid the cornstalks, alone amid busy growth.

I walk the empty back streets, waiting for the rain,

To wash away the misery and the feelings of sloth.

But then something changed, nothing stays the same,

A feeling of hope as bud pushing against a roof of earth.

Let the minute, the hour, the day take all the blame,

The feelings of high and low give insight into our worth.

In the deepest well, one can still see daylight;

The crumbs from life’s table never tasted so good.

The stars still shine bravely in the darkest night;

Their message reached me in time, understood.

- - - - - -

I (c) John Herlihy 11 July 2020