The middle of the tri-state rush,
New York always looming
Just across the water.
Many friends, they came and went,
A piece of my heart with each.
I guess, deep down, we knew
What was all around us,
What foul creatures loomed
In the shadows around the corner.
We walked in groups and laughed
Regardless of these evils,
Because growing up in Smalltown, USA,
We didn't have much of a choice.
We were kids then,
And by all rights of the word,
We are still kids now.
We grew up making jokes
About the carjack capital
And the drugs on the street.
We all took our turns
Hiding from those cops,
Hiding from the criminals,
And hiding from each other.
It was all a game then,
Back in Smalltown, USA.
In each face there was something more
Than what our backgrounds held,
Something more than race and religion,
Something more than all of us.
We didn't care who you were,
Or who you wished to be,
Because at the moment,
The kids we were,
We lived only for today.
I guess inside I knew where I was,
I knew what was happening around me.
We grew up tough, but we had dreams,
And we shared our dreams together.
I guess inside I understood
Those dreams wouldn't all come true,
For Smalltown, USA, was just the bitter start.
Many left, as did I, but oh so many stayed.
The ones I grieve for most of all,
Are the ones stuck there forever.
I returned to Smalltown, USA,
And drove those streets of memory.
I drove by your resting place
And did not even know.
Happy to see a street sign
Of common memory to us all,
No one told me as I passed
That you'd taken your final breath.
I passed by without a thought
Of the memory torn away,
The life so short, just twenty four,
That ended there one year ago.
I told you once, as you held your guitar,
You were destined to be Jimi Hendrix reborn.
You smiled that smug, joking grin,
And let another chord scream by.
Now I look upon my guitar,
You finger prints polished in,
Unable to stop thinking of Hendrix
And who you should have been.
In the saddest way you share a bond
With the man I compared you to,
Because just like Jimi Hendrix,
You were taken from us too soon.
In Smalltown, USA, people die everyday.
You read about it, hear about it,
And pass them all away.
With each life stolen on those streets
A gap is left behind.
To many you are just another victim
Of a common Smalltown homicide,
But to your friends you left behind,
And the things you could have done,
You are more, my friend, so much more,
And a loss to this fine world.
My trips to Smalltown will not be in vain,
For when I go you'll ride along
And live those memories with me again.
I'll pass your house, the guitar shop,
The places of our youth.
I'll nod a memory to your college,
And keep your face burned in my mind.
No stories will ever erase
The image I have of you,
The big, bright smile,
The intelligent mind,
And the man who should've ruled.
Jhmil Johnson 1979-2004 A victim of homicide You are loved and missed, Mel Mel |
Bronze trophy winner
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