I wrote this poem over twenty-four years ago when I was still attending the University of Oregon and finishing up my English degree. I regularly studied at the Erb Memorial Union, and on more than a few occasions I saw homeless people come into the lounge to find a place to sleep. This one man in particular struck me as being handsome but very unkempt with long, dark hair framing his face. I don’t believe I ever had a chance to talk to him, but he became the inspiration for this poem. I hope you enjoy it.
“Fallen Lion”
The man has a lion’s face – broad and strong-looking,
with a mane of dark brown hair framing the rest.
A real lion would be cleaner, however.
The whiskers grow almost out of control, no longer beautiful,
not even savage, just pathetically limp and dark, lifeless.
The mane of hair is also dirty. And he smells –
not like the rich, natural scent of veldt on sandpaper hide,
but the sick odor of the wounded animal who is too ill to care
for itself for long.
The man slinks along when he walks, but it is a graceless
movement, a half-shamble, half-lurching sort of slink
that a cat might make if it had three feet.
The man has two; for a two-legged cat, perhaps mortally wounded,
he does it quite well.
His arms, if they are not carrying a bottle or bag,
hang limply at his sides, loose appendages
that sway almost without rhythm save for his movement,
graceless.
Occasionally the man will growl, and others
who may not have noticed him there before
will stop and listen, uncomprehending, or if they do,
they turn away, unheeding.
Have they never seen a hungry animal before?
Of course they have.
But this one has two legs. And begs. And begs again.
Like a dog. Not like a lion, who knows what to look for.
And gets it.
David Eric Freedman
March 10, 1992
Freedman on the Go 