zazu

All we can hear are the sounds of our feet walking on in the silence.
We tread lightly, but our thoughts are slipping away. Our feet don't stop. They keep on walking.

There was a boy who lived in the little house just off the highway.
The house with the chipped red paint and the overgrown backyard that ran wild and reckless like a jungle.
It was what the boy liked to pretend it was, anyway.

Somewhere on that block was my house.
The one with the chalk drawings out front, that washed away every time it rained,
Or were spray painted over with the hose.
The one where my feet tapped their way down the pavement,

Flowers are rare in the city.
I mean the kind that grow naturally.
The kind that aren't re-potted in some flower box,
or sitting in jars on the front steps,
or cared for on rooftop gardens.

The call for help sounds like a siren,
Rising and falling like the waves of the ocean.
Tossing and turning as you lie awake in bed,
Unable to quiet the storm that's raging in your head.

    Max turns to leave, lifting his face up towards the endless sky, which somehow seems to be a reflection of his own dull, grey eyes, and letting the raindrops beat down on it.