Old Navy Footlocker

By popular demand...

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good4somethingbum
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Old Navy Footlocker

Post by good4somethingbum » Tue Jan 16, 2018 5:28 pm

Old Navy Footlocker ©2018 Robert George

Well, I climbed that cobwebbed staircase with some old bolt cutters
And they sliced that Master padlock just like it was butter
Then I lifted up the lid and felt his mem’ries flow out
Brushed away some dust then looked inside and I had no doubt
I’d found the stark, unvarnished truth

Deck of cards, a handmade chessboard and a barbecue fork
An old Sinatra forty-five of “New York, New York”
And a sad memento from the Mekong River
The tiny piece of shrapnel that’d nicked his liver
During two tours of a tarnished youth

O my granpa’s soul was wise and old
But he never was a talker
Now it seems his tales are being told
By his rusty Navy foot locker

Fam’ly recipes for pasta and a spicy calzone
Pottery and trinkets from the Panama Canal Zone
First edition Faulkner and a vintage Batman, too

There’s a necklace made of stingray leather with a shark tooth
But the only thing that seemed to hide a dark truth
Was a barmaid’s snapshot down in Katmandu

O my granpa’s soul was wise and old
But he never was a talker
Now it seems his tales are being told
By his rusty Navy foot locker

Found some faded photographs beside his Dundee lighter
And they proved his last days as a tough, bare knuckle fighter
Left him with a scar and cauliflower ears

Then I thought about my own life and the time I’ve wasted
How life is sometimes sweeter for the sour fruit we’ve tasted
While forever siphons our years

O my granpa’s soul was wise and old
But he never was a talker
Now it seems his tales are being told
By his rusty Navy foot locker

Spoken

I was playing poker in a tavern in Nepal
Losing big and drinking pure grain alcohol
When a grey-haired barmaid with a kind, familiar face
Turned up at the table like a lucky ace
She said my crooked smile and eyes of ocean blue
Looked just like a dashing lover she once knew…

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