from Alsip to Iceland

What becomes of the brokenhearted?
i don't know.
But one of them
woke up one
morning
and looked at life
differently.

One of them gathered The 4 That Mattered Most into
a 1973 VW super-beetle convertible
and drove it
all the way
from Alsip to Iceland
hoping to get there
before the clock struck 12.

One of them wrote something down
every day
in the back of his mind for 40 years
and waited 40 years
to read
between the lines.

One of them took a lot of
the blame and
felt a lot of the shame
for making some really really stupid
choices
at important times
and paid
a big fat price for it.

One of them learned to laugh
out loud
when things got shaky
and shake
out loud
when it got too hard
to laugh.

One of them said what he
had to say.
Touched who he could touch
along the way,
paid union dues
and wore black work shoes
as shiny as a promise
to a ghost.

What becomes of the brokenhearted?
i don't know.
But one of them
woke up one
morning
and looked at life
differently.