BORN WORTHWHILE WAY DOWN SOUTH

Hear Jim Reed’s Red Clay Diary podcast:  https://youtu.be/1dpAnfSKodw

or read the transcript below:

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Life, actually…

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BORN WORTHWHILE WAY DOWN SOUTH

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A lean and lank shirtless wanderer walks purposely down Third Avenue North on an almost-hundred-degree afternoon. The sun presses down, the concrete radiates upward, the breeze secludes itself.

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Inside the bookshop a lean and lank fully-clothed browser scans shelves purposely beneath the pleasurable AC air, within earshot of a mellow jazz piano.

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Outside, the unbloused nomad stops at a corner trash receptacle and leans in to scrounge for edibles. Barring food, he is also alert for things pawnable. There is half a pack of fries. He fetches it quickly and gracefully, munching as the search continues.

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Within the bookshop a few feet away, the book enthusiast opens a volume and instantly reads,

“Alone in the night

On a dark hill

With pines around me

Spicy and still…”

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The reader is surprised and mystified. He reads further. He will not allow this moment to fade.

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On the other side of the front wall, the shirtless man’s skin glistens as he twirls in the light and continues his strolling quest for nourishment. The wadded paper fry-pack is poetry in his hands.

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Inside, the half-smiling bookperson feels oddly nourished by the words of Sara Teasdale. Food is out of reach, out of mind.

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The lone bookshop proprietor peers over his counter, watching customer and poacher simultaneously, one within breathing distance, the other through the large plate glass window.

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For an instant, the shopkeeper feels like a peeping tom. Then, his writerly instincts remind him of his duty to permanently record these two lives, these two gestures in time.

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So that you and I can witness.

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So that we can attest to the significance of these otherwise invisible angels

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© 2025 A.D. by Jim Reed