I was a cutting the empty shell of what was always meant to flower my somewhat withered roots those tangled thorny barbs were beaten, crushed to powder by the grinding heels which pound life's highway yet come the spring of middle age I claimed the time anew, and flourished strong no longer swamped by rain which fell upon my dusty head it washed me from the drain where life had placed my weary self I found rebirth in lost but still familiar tracks and a writer grew between the pavement cracks