Pieces of a Piece to be titled 'Fable of a Man'

I've been planning this piece for a while - here are a couple bits I jotted down somewhere back in October.

I was crossing a bridge, and an old man was crossing from the other end. In front of me, two tourists stopped to take model-pose photographs with river backdrop. A girl, I guess, was also walking behind me. The bridge was new, made of steel. Shiny and modern. The old man had on a driving cap. He wore a brown jacket, and his eye-glasses rimmed wellworn and wise eyes. I couldn't tell if he was looking at me. I turned and looked up the river. Saturday river docks, cranes looming mechanical future over new commercial buildings and beyond all that, the bay. I was still crossing, arms pulled down by overfilled grocery bags; like with two big suitcases, but more awkward and less impressive. I was quite conscious of the fact that I had only turned my head sideways to avoid the old man's gaze. He had stopped, leaning comfortably against the railing. He was staring straight at me. He had on clothes which befit his age and his demeanor. Or rather he had this demeanor of which his clothes, his glasses, his cap, and his white beard were all a part, and he leaned comfortably, lean and still spry, against the railing. As I approached I saw that he was looking at me. He saw something in me that I didn't know was there. He was watching it. His eyes had that aged wrinkled shape that is a recollection of younger less-seen days. He was young despite his white hair. Like old Gil, that wise old grandfather, young despite his age. He was watching that thing in me -- I supposed it was my nobility. I supposed he was watching and seeing, knowing what I was to be, seeing perhaps himself fifty years past. It then occurred to me that he may have been more discriminating, that he may have been condemning me, hating me even. I passed, and as I did I averted my stare to the steel floor below me. Twas the casual head drop which says "Whatever passes now is no care of mine, I'm just walking." He had watched me without remorse, without stipulation or concern. He is past the point where he thinks it is presumptuous to stare someone down. It's not shamelessness: it's abandon of the whole argument of shame. He stopped walking and stood and stared because he saw something he wanted to watch.

When I had finished crossing, arms aching from my bags, I turned and continued home along the river. After a few moments I turned back and looked at the bridge. The old man was most of the way across now. He walked slowly.

* * *

There are 400,000 poets (for poets we all are) searching for the perfect pop song. Or, at least, for a word of truth. 400,000 we are who stand by ponds and watch ice melt, making groundbreaking televised statements in our heads, reveling in our individual geniuses and then renouncing ourselves to the murky bottom of hopelessness and mediocrity. We are young, so we are apt to be idealists. Few of us in fact harbor utopian dreams, seeking the smile in every dead soul. But we all have our ambitions. We want to make the world as good for others as it is for us. We want them to see that everything really and truly is alright, we want them to taste the satisfaction that exists in every breath. Most of all we want to find refuge, or rather to make a hermitage where the drama of life can collapse, leaving us with pure Eidenic innocence. We want symposium, the fulfillment of that Greek sage's prophecy wherein man is completed in woman, and woman through man. We want the infinite availability of experience and adventure, but we want that one with whom the being of it all will be duplicated and, so rendered, absolute. For we are 400,000 presently alone. As the ice melts, and our eyes widen with glee, and childlike energy once more enlivens us and makes us want to dance carelessly, and hug and grasp the next closest person -- we turn to find we are alone. All has fallen, all has momentarily vanquished its tension within us... but for naught. 400,000 poets we are who wait together for the first bloom so as to sing its praises in the glory of regenerative Earth, and 400,000 poets asunder we shut our lips and remember our downward stare. We stand, each of us, around this same pond, surrounded by these same leafless trees, and we all stare at our feet. Why! The old man passes by, he sees us all standing pedestrian and self-consumed, and he does not smile. He merely passes through, white with wisdom, clothed with vague indifference. 400,000 poets stand aloof-- we, we stand aloof, and wait for the ice to melt.