Old man of the road

The idea behind this poem is: finding the same face in the same place at a designated time each day in some part of your life. We all have experienced such situations (esp. in childhood) where we see a stranger go about his/her business everyday and your timings coincide. Slowly you don't feel like strangers anymore even though you have not uttered a single word to each other ever and silently cross each other's path everyday. Once that part of your life is over, you forget this known and yet unknown face easily, until one day when you reminisce about your past and you find that familiar face peeping at you...

He walks alone along the winding road,

with a head hung low, adheres to its code.

Bent with age, like a fruit laden bough 

leaning on his cane, everyday I watch him go.

And think, there goes the old man of the road.

Some days he stands in a corner,

confused about the ways of this world.

Some days he is the charmer and 

kids surround him to hear stories unfurl.

When he leaves to go, they object in vain

And I think to myself, 

there goes the old man of the road again.

In the summers, he wears a thin trouser

holds a tattered brolly when it rains.

As the days grow cold and chilly,

from under a ragged capote complains.

No matter the weather or season

everyday he meets the road.

And I tell my friends on my way home,

"Look there's our beacon, the old man of the road". 

The curvy lines on his forehead, 

has much to tell

that in the wrinkles of his face,

 all the wisdom doth dwell.

With a voice that runs deep 

as deep as a diving bell,

and a gaze upon those bottomless eyes, 

could put one under a spell.

If only someone was there to listen, or to hear him foretell.

To look into those eyes and see the unfathomed ocean swell.

And in my mind before I sleep, I bid old man of the road farewell.

I know not where he comes from or where he goes,

but every time he sees me, he mumbles "Hello!".

I know not for how long he would continue to be,

but just like the sky that converges into sea,

his is the road and the road's is he.

He smiles into a toothless grin as a bird that is free,

And I think to myself,

 "When he is gone, may be the world won't miss him,

but so shan't he, so shan't he"...