Jokes were told at Al's expense, he was always made the goat
Some were harmless as it goes, but some were cruel
Al would nod his head and smile, and go on working all the while
Just to be one of the boys he played the fool

He headed off each evening in his lonely silent world
The jokes and pain wore off as he walked home
He fixed supper for himself on a rusty hot plate ring
Then he'd remember his reflections in the chrome

He did the dishes after dinner until they glistened
Then he'd sit down with his paper and his pen
And until very late at night, Albert Appleton would write
He let out all of the words he kept within

He polished up his metaphors and he buffed his rhyming verse
He vacuumed out the corners of his mind
When he didn't show for work one week, they found him on the floor
And they found twelve hundred poems he left behind

No one realized that he could write, much less the way he did
He was taken for the fool he seemed to be
He couldn't hear and he couldn't speak but he wrote in brilliant rhymes
He was a genius in our midst that we didn't see

They did a story of his life in The New Yorker magazine
A posthumous book of poems drew rave reviews
Some poems were harmless as they go but some were cold and cruel
And the boys at Sammy's car wash weren't amused

They told jokes at Al's expense, he was always made the goat
Sammy's car wash still washed cars with the same old folks
They hired a new man to vacuum ashtrays and the back seats of the cars
And they made damn sure he could talk and hear their jokes

Albert Appleton worked down at Sammy's car wash
He was taken for the fool he seemed to be
He used to nod his head and smile, go on working all the while
He was the genius in our midst that we didn't see
He was the genius, in our midst, that we didn't see

© 1985 by Harry Lipson