The Crossing Guard

The Crossing Guard The crossing guard smiled a weary smile To the wee little child that crossed the guard. The child had learned all about arctic foxes While the crossing guard toiled About life’s tricky boxes That were placed around him and forced him To sit with that hexagon sign Rust speckled edges While the child skipped on by with a smile and a wave Precocious, happy-go-lucky way But the guard didn’t see it. And kept on with his ways. Picking and futzing inside of his mind Worries about life, love, and longing astride When he took on this job there was only one goal To see life at its best in the young not the old But by sitting there holding that sign every day Somewhere somehow he had lost his way Perhaps had the sign said Go and not Stop His life would become something the masses Would fancy about. But the wee little child that crossed him each day Did care about him in his own special way And one day the child that had painted a forest Filled with dart frogs, tree snakes, and anacondas Decided to gift him his art And was met by another When reaching the crossing guard This other was asked about the old man And he learned with great sorrow that the old man had left Determined to find the old man was the child And he asked his dear Mum to please offer her help And she did and she learned that the man had passed on And was buried close by at the Eagle’s resting home The boy and his Mum paid visit to him and his mound of Fresh dirt that smelled oddly of mint A rainbow of flowers signaled some love for the man And the boy gifted his art to the land.