Perhaps all men are like Chaplin,
Bumbling and falling and seeing titles
Brace their existence, though no one speaks.
And we must wander wobbling streets
Meshed in obscure customs of
that we cannot extricate, a small ship
That hesitates to meet a foreign shore.
The sun is black; the walls are white,
A gracious lady awaits her stumbling fate
And as we are, it is unknown, if a small crowd
Has gathered here as if about a fire
To stir sense in these outtakes by their ridicule,
Or else some editor to cut the strands
At whim if it pleases– it need not be a tragedy,
When the last reel spins– a mere ornamented fin,
A jaunty tune, a tramp merging with the distance–
Some tears amidst applause, but mostly laughter–
that one man could stumble so, and redirect himself
Suffer the swings and the barrages as the fool,
Not a sanctified, cripple Christ but a solid man
Up and down the alleys of hard earth dignifying,
Unaware of bruises, that God has taken everything
From him, a wife, a family– the curtain pulls;
the organ grinder bows.
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