Boy With Paper Wings

There is a boy with paper wings
Whose paint-peeled soul matches the
Disgusting walls of his drab apartment
He stands
Staring out the dirty window
Out into the concrete
Flexing his torn and flimsy wings
He sighs
Staring down at the lines of color
The sea teeming with life
And noise and filth and food and smoke…
The boy folds his tired wings
Closes his broken form
Walks across the littered ground
Treading softly over balled up paper
And marked out delusions
The boy plays his broken guitar
It was all he was good at
And all he was good for
The sea cries out in a clash of
Horns and thunder
The boy with paper wings returns to his perch
Stretching out his only worth
Scarred and pocked from more abusive lives
Flapping them with remorse
Ichors crying with the realization of the future
He jumps; breaking through the ochre glass
As the sun perks up his solemn head
Casting life and happiness down
The boy’s wings fumble and crack and tear and fall
And the boy collapses into a concrete sea