The Engraved Silver Pocket-watch

The old man rocks slowly back and forth,
He sits alone on the far end of the park bench,
His eyes are closed in deep concentration,
And his old worn hands lie motionless on his lap,
His head is bowed towards the ground,
As if to say that his tired neck can no longer support its weight,
It is the image of a man broken by long years of hard labor,
But really, it is that of a heart broken from years of unrequited love,
As he sits there, his rhythmic motion marking the final moments of his life,
He tries to remember times long past and ventures long forgotten,
But most of all he longs to remember the girl he once loved,
The engraved silver pocket-watch that he retrieves from his jacket,
Is the only physical reminder that remains,
Softly ticking, counting down the seconds until the end,
As his fingers tighten around the watch and its chain,
He focuses all of his earthly energy on a single memory,
And, though it is distant, he strains his mind,
To unbury the one person he'd been burying for the longest,
To recall for just a moment the last time they had shared together,
It had been on a cool clear evening that he had last visited the bench,
A cool evening some fifty-three years earlier,
And now, not only is he much older, but he is alone,
She had had long flowing hair of a light shade of brown,
And sparkling blue eyes that always smiled from within,
It had been an unforgettable and life-changing evening,
If he had only known at the time the significance that it would hold,
He would have made sure to examine every detail,
The beautifully defined lines of her elegant figure,
The way she had looked up to him and smiled into his face,
The way she had shyly giggled and grasped his hands in her own,
He would be able to call it all up and feel content in his final moments,
But instead the episode is just a distant memory,
And the poor old man strains to remember it,
He strains to remember how her soft skin had felt to his touch,
But all he can feel now is the cold hard metal of his watch,
It mocks his hands like the harsh reality of the world,
His final connection to that world before he leaves it at last,
Gently slumping over he loses the battle--all remaining strength,
And everything is forgotten,
His broken heartbeat fades to nothing,
His final breath escapes his lips,
And as if to mark the finality of the moment,
The whitened knuckles of his fist begin to unclench,
And the engraved silver pocket-watch drops from his hand,
Suspended over the ground by its chain,
Wrapped around a single finger.

Peace,
Justin