Token
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Token
by Patrick Cornwall on Friday, January 20, 2012 at 10:08am
He was the last of his kind and it was known.
Some dated him one hundred years and he had style.
Christmas was his time and the rest of the year he felt nothing.
But Thanksgiving came and some cared and tried to help.
They came in their vans with Almighty Church of Thanksgiving and Christmas painted on its sides.
But after the New Year he was alone again except for his friend the rat.
He slept in the subway, where it wasn't too bad.
His clothes were in tatters and the rat brought him food.
His blanket was newspapers which he read and then slept underneath.
Sometimes the rat read to him while he snoozed.
The niners went casually around him and his newspapers but some listened to the rat reading.
The rat was nice and sometimes the Old Man would read to him too.
The rat loved the funnies and would roll over holding his stomach laughing.
The Old Man grabbed his Thunderbird and gave some to the rat.
The rat drank when in the mood and most times he was.
The rat wasn't supposed to drink because of his high blood pressure.
The old man loved the rat but he often disappeared and it made him sad.
He took a pull and wondered where the rat had gone and braced against the cold.
He saw the rat sitting in the booth where the tokens went and rat waved him through.
He was hungry and searching found a perfectly good hamburger in the pickup window.
People watched as he dug in the trash can and the train lighting the tunnel.
He washed the burger down with the last of his Thurnderbird and decided to get on the train before it came.
Copyright © Patrick Cornwall | Year Posted 2012
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