by John W
How long it had been he could no longer tell
Since his ship had sunk in that horrible storm
This island salvation his heaven, that he was alone, his hell.
His busy life had sunk with his ship, loneliness now his norm.
So when that day a wisp of smoke on the horizon he saw,
Down familiar paths, almost forgotten his mind had raced.
How to attract their attention, how to span this gaping maw?
By a flotsam and jetsam beacon of fire he hoped to be traced.
Frantically he plied the now dried wood with torch close at hand.
To escape this forsaken isle all his brain could envision.
Too long had he suffered, too long he had been alone in this land.
From this hell of loneliness he would be done, a man on a mission.
The gathering clouds would not blind them, they would see his light.
Higher and higher went the logs, it seemed each matched a day in exile.
His torched beacon now an inferno, blazing into the darkening night,
He screamed for their attention, caring not if their senses he did defile.
The panic that possessed him blossomed into virtual insanity
As failure loomed more clearly than salvation on the horizon.
His mission doomed, his fate revealed, his loneliness again his reality.
His tears by now uncontrollable, in torrents down his face did run.
No wonder the eyes in the bushes he could not, would not see.
Nor the voices of the others close by he could not, would not, hear.
For marooned he was not, his loneliness his choice to be
Even though surrounded by people whose presence he did fear.
But he had longed to escape them, from their humanity flee
When his chance appeared he grasped it, like one overboard a ring at sea.
His insanity so complete, fear he projected in all he could hear and see.
He harbored no one who would shed a light on his “marooned” fantasy.
He came to, again, relieved he had laid in enough spirits for this day.
He inhaled the first drink, then quickly the next two with no delay.
Tomorrow, if it came, would be another challenge, another day.
The calm settled in, alone in this motel room, rescue just a balcony away.
