What a Man?

Was a man, 
Who did walk as tall (as tall as can be) 
As all the animals did too.
Had a oneness with himself - 
Oh, sweet yes!

Who lived in a hut 
Underneath the everlasting twitters
Of the neverlasting birdies.
And overneath the critters 
Which died under tenderless foot.
Had a twoness, too, 
With his beast friend, 
Deep down in the dankest wood.
So too deep for comfort, 
But unnot so for... and... joy.

But not he knew the where, 
The when, 
And the why (never far behind)
Of this small happy-ever-after of his.
Lived until his heart bled black blood 
(And that heart was as large as his body was up)
Upon the crunching leaves 
Of his last-ever earth’s Autumn.

Met this man on a yesterday, 
Because tomorrow never did come -
Until it did quite yesterday, 
When he so, so died!

In that past I’d “hello” 
On the top of my so-called breath.
But made sure (as sure can be) not to very befriend the friendless man.
Didn’t weigh him down with pretty talk -
Of all of a nothing, such pretty talk.
Spoke when spoken to. 
(Never after or before.)
And gloried in the silence 
Which knocked on the door
Of his oh-so-vast and wild.

He liked it on his own.
That’s the way he liked it - on his own.
And he did so like it, on his own.
He was the man to be with 
In the dark night of the stomach’s eruption
And that ever-lessening being.

He lived inside the mountains 
On the smiling stars
And in-between each everything 
That would let him be.
That’s as good as good can be - 
And never an inch more!
It was so verily good!

His life was the wild life.
A life that went up so far (but necessarily no more!),
Rather than down, deep down, 
To the death and the dead,
Who slept in their humble pile 
Between himself and the living.

Out in the sky, 
He’d catch the trout’s full flight 
(As it flew for flying’s sake),
That existed on its long tale.
And up too into the water 
He would snatch the bird 
From its nest of thorns -
Of very fine thorns.

When this man did die 
(And die it’ll be for us too),
He died with himself, and for himself.
Not one or a few did false tears cry.
Nor heat up the tea for the steaming belly 
In that waketype thing that’s oh-so-often had.
Nor did someone (or even no one) do anything that is something…
Something more than nothing less.
And this lessness of his iswas the best way to be
As was said by those unwritten books, 
Left unwritten in the tall man’s wild
And pretty damn world -
Pretty damn world!