Old Benson Poem by David Welch

Harvey grew up in a small Maine town,
due north of Portland, and out of the way,
like most kids he'd go to the school bus
at the beginning of every week day.

And every day that he made that ride
he saw sitting on the side of the road,
an old man dressed in tattered duds,
sitting in the same spot, atop a flat stone.

He asked his bus-driver about the man,
she smiled as she explained to Harvey,
"Oh, that's ol' Benson, he always sits there.
He's harmless, but a little bit crazy."

For years Harvey just accepted this,
all the adults in town said the same,
Benson was just a poor old fellow
who had something wrong inside his brain.

But as a young man, Harvey started to think
that maybe they were just telling lies,
never once had Harvey see any madness
in the look of Old Benson's green eyes.

So one day Harvey drove the road after work
and pulled aside near where Benson did sit,
he walked up to the man, gave a slight smile,
Old Benson happily returned it.

"I hope you don't mind me disturbing you,
but I've been driving by this spot for years,
and every single time I see you sitting,
is there something special about this place here? "

Benson then grinned, "I just like this spot,
though I suppose any will do for me."
Harvey frowned. "But I do not get it,
what is there on this roadside to see? "

Benson said, "I see a bit of the whole world,
and all that this fine planet can bring.
Besides, it had always been my job
to sit back and keep an eye on things."

Harvey just sighed and then nodded sadly,
said, "Well, I guess I'll leave you to it then."
Benson just smiled. "If that's what you wish,
but I'm betting you'll come back again."

So Harvey forgot about that crazy man,
and just went on with the business of life.
Old Benson didn't even enter his thoughts
until skimming the internet one night.

He was doing research for the parade
celebrating the town's anniversary,
when he came upon a curious sketch,
dated seventeen hundred eighty-three.

There a figure sat on a hillside,
next to a rutted, winding carriage road,
drawn wearing familiar, tattered rags,
looking for all the world like a hobo.

Benson! Though Harvey, with a small laugh,
the resemblance really was quite great,
but he ignored it until he saw
a picture from eighteen sixty-eight.

There again on the very same road,
sat the crazy old man with a grin,
waving at a carriage as it passed by
in what looked like the bloom of spring.

Utterly stunned, Harvey then poured through
the town'sphotographic archives,
the twenties, fifties, eighties and today
revealed to Harvey the very same sight.

Then for some reason that to this day
Harvey is at a loss to explain,
the teachings of his old physics professor
started running quickly though his brain.

He'd talked often of an old experiment,
the ‘double slit' were his exact words,
he'd said, "Strangely enough, some phenomena
only come about when a thing is observed."

And in Harvey's mind a strange notion came,
what if Benson played a similar role?
He'd said it was his job to watch over things,
the implications of it made Harvey go cold.

Was it possible that the crazy old man
was the lynchpin everything rested on?
Did his watching the world make it all exist,
if he stopped, would the whole thing be gone?

Harvey didn't get too much sleep that night,
his mind could not stop reexamining
the pictures he'd seen, the notion he'd had,
the contradictions that just kept burning...

So Harvey left home early the next day,
thinking that it was he who'd gone nuts,
but the idea kept pushing, so he went out,
driving to Benson's spot in his pick-up truck.

But when he drew close he saw nobody there,
no Benson sitting perched on his stone.
He got out of the truck, scanned the whole place,
but quickly realized that he was alone.

Feeling very confused, Harvey noticed then
a scrap of paper left there on the rock,
covered in script in an old man's hand,
written hastily out on the spot.

It said: ‘Harvey, you're the first in a while
who has ever figure my secret out,
I'd try to explain, but given the physics,
you wouldn't know what I'm talking about.

Unfortunately, I have got to move on,
though I've loved this cool spot by the woods,
but as I once told you, for a job like this
any old place is really just as good.'

Harvey never showed it to anyone,
and some days still thinks he's insane,
since after that day nobody else in town
could even recall Old Benson's name.

But for all the confusion plaguing his mind
he always seems to take solace in this:
Old Benson must still be out there somewhere,
otherwise how could our world still exist?

And deep in Brazil, near the Amazon,
a strange tale by the locals is told,
of a man dressed in rags, sitting by a tree,
smiling at all who pass him on the road.