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THE ICE CREAM MAN
I am Nick the ice cream man.
My name is Nick and I'm still an ice cream man.
No-one can stop me.
The sky is an angry red. Where are the kids.
My customers. Where are the streets. No sound.
Only a faintish whirring
And the bell of my ice cream wagon
Which I'm pulling along behind me.
I love to ring that bell.
All the kiddies know it's me. Nick the ice cream man.
Soon they'll be running out to greet me
With sticky money fingers, greedy eyes.
But no-one I know comes.
The bell hurts their ears. The ones still here.
I don't mean for the bell to hurt their ears
Those bloody charcoal children who
Come running at me screaming.
I have a gun.
I put them out of their misery.
There must be ice cream, hard ice cream
Left somewhere. I'll never survive on no income.
This is bad news.
But I watch carefully or children with my remaining
Eye.
Half my face has been burnt off.
I'll try not to notice.
I have stuck half a dozen or so onto the side of my face.
Very good for burns. Nice and cold.
And they actually stuck.
I'm like a lopsided statue of liberty.
Everything is painful and sticky.
My bell is ringing.
I am still a man. |
