Somebody Comes to This Place

It is an old story.
 
Somebody comes to this place
and grows up in the shadows of buildings
and stars and other somebodies

Somebody learns to love:
to know intimately the houses
of the spirit and the flesh.

Somebody learns to hate and kill
and scream and curse like hell.

Somebody learns to be afraid and lonely
and sad, and to know the secret
of darkness.

Somebody learns to like the rain,
and things which are soft and green,
and hot food and cold water,
and the blanket of sleep,
and the music of the land and the sky.

Somebody learns so many things.

It is an old story.

Somebody comes to this place
and lives
and then goes away forever.

-Richard Brautigan