Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
Feb 2010
This is the story of Old Man Jenkins
Old, yes, but he never felt that way

If being young meant being corrupt, he’d have no part
Stubborn, he wouldn’t change his ways

He would simply avoid this new perverse world
To keep himself in the good ol’ days

The days when neighbors looked out for each other
When you knew your mailman’s name

When men held the door for ladies
And success didn’t have to mean fame

He reminisced of days when a living was honest
When families had a father and a mother

When talking in person was the best was to talk
And one shirt was as good as another

But oh how they teased him,
They’d say “He’s just an old man”

And they’d compare his brain
To a lone grain of sand

They said he wasn’t modern or up with the times
They said he was ignorant and out of his mind

They would try to make him angry
Hounding him over and over again

But Old Man Jenkins was the gentlest of souls
And returned only a wrinkled grin

You see, he wasn’t mad or crazy
And he minded not their scorn

He had been storing up a better treasure
Since the very day he was born

After he left this world, they realized
They saw how bad they were wrong

They longed to tell him they were sorry
But the time for that had come and gone

It may be myth, but one once said
And others have repeated it since then

That the gentle soul of Old Man Jenkins
Smiled on them with a wrinkled grin.
Notes: Inspired by my grandfather and the generation that grew up in the Great Depression and fought in the second World War.
Written by
Blake Watson
1.4k
 
Please log in to view and add comments on poems