A Later Draft

*

Every crumpled page says the same thing;

Once there was a man who needed nothing.

so let me start again.

having broken my bones against the wall,

which was again unmoved; having pulled

a thousand mornings in through a cigarette

I concede, to the blank page in a still typewriter.

that I must abandon revision, for a new draft,

to find the words which I’ve worked to polish dead.

Tell the real beginning now or the false one forever.

Tell what you’ve hidden, what your shadow says;

Once there was a boy who needed one thing.

                            
                                   -Brent Allard