Ensconced beside the lamp post

He sits in solitude, so quiet

An inextricable bond

With his sole companion

Rested tenderly under his chin

Unruffled by the strident pavement

He gropes for the bow with trembling fingers

The strings tugging deep into his heart’s core

An euphonious melody unfelt by the passing crowd

His shrunken eyes forever lost in darkness

Enclosed only within his world of music

The mellifluous notes – so pure, so soft

As of a virtuoso violinist

He quivers now and then in the perishing darkness

When the yuletide breeze wraps around his skeletal body

But drawn on his withered face

A smile so innocent – and all sweet

As if fallen into a nostalgic reverie

Of the past, the love, the music of his life

Now engraved in the fiddle and pegs of tears

Amidst the congested traffic din

And the muffled voices of the street horde

Receding into the eventide

Is a plaintive cry of a soul

Scratched upon a forlorn tune