the hidden man
bobby lester
it was night when i crawled into the box
it has been night ever since
i wait all the time
sometimes when i sleep i dream
of walking slow in some rain
my body covered over with a blanket
warm like a young bird in a nest
when mother brings me dinner
a snack of biscuits and tea...
i am her young bird in the nest
somewhere there is an ocean and clouds
and sand...
i feel the fine mist kiss my cheeks
it has been so long
i don't forget
in my hand by the dim candle i hold
pictures of me as a young man before
freedom burst from clenched teeth
i said the unthinkable
i walked to the middle of the road
we were all there linked together but i
am the only one left
the others fell from me bruised and bathed in blood
i stood with fear on the most barren road
in defense i fell beside them sheltering beneath their stiff arms
it took so long for the killers to go...
i lived a whole life that summer day
when the darkness finally did come i ran fast to my home
never looking to my left or behind
i knew that
mothers always shelter their young
and she did...she gave me the box
in here the box is my world's limit
5 by 8 dirt on the floor
a thing that is not particularly desirable
but it is my hold on this life
i lay mostly on my side listening to music reading sometimes
boredom makes me crazy and suicidal
some days when i am missing some
thing or one particularly desirable
i wonder if they have killed me even though i breathe
i have a name only mother knows
no one saw the soul shrink behind them in the forest
mother cries and cries sometimes when she sees the pressure
points on my body bleed
for her too it is a long frightening thing
21 years i have lived in this box
inches from the morning quivering at the sound of strange hands
lying in the still
in a basket next to my shoulder i keep a pistol
once upon a time for defense from my enemies
but now it is my defense from
the tenacious will to live on
after mother and the landscape wither brown
when the heaviness stays within me dithering and sorrowful
mother often says be loyal
stand steadfast
but i was never the bravest...
only the loudest
(adnan muhammed knobi lived 21 years in a box behind his family's dining room wall to escape execution. he was liberated when he was 49 years old.)
