You, Detective
by P. H. Madore © 2006
You know not what it's like to be a grown man crying. How it feels to see those tears clean the ashen face of your first and only born. What it's like to be a hardened hard-ass, an aging winner, and melt like a newborn. To kiss your only child goodbye kneeling by the gutter. To be smacked by the situation's feral reality and wonder what needs to be done now, have you tampered with the scene, is it too late to catch the guilty.
You don't know me and I'm fine without you. I've seen you smoking your cigars and laughing. My pain is that of all grown men everywhere, all those who know about losses. Who've fallen into themselves and slugged on. And for your sake I hope you never do, and you don't feel my pain, detective.
I laugh in your face now just minutes later, I answer your questions, dare you to judge, beseech you to bother. Cast a stone, make it a big one.
I'd switch places right now without a question or whispered prayer skyward. Gladly and laughing at the joke of it all I would.The End
