OTIS the Flamingo
I came across a poem I wrote when I was in high school about a flamingo named Otis. It made me giggle at first because I can see all of the teenage angst in the words describing what the poem was really about at that time. I thought it might pertain to current times, and it inspired me to draw Otis the flamingo. 49-year old Luke, take some advice from 16-year old Luke:
OTIS AND HIS LOTUS
I learned about a bird named Otis
Crying in a lush lagoon
Underneath a glowing moon
Grieving on a midnight hour,
He had lost a special flower
Loss was when he stopped to notice
How he loved this precious lotus
People watched him all alone
Never knowing they were seen
Otis found them quite obscene
Until he saw what made them great
That, even though they segregate,
Among the things they’re guilty of,
They don’t abandon those they love
They seem to leave the ones they use
And ponder over what they lose
If I could gain, in human lingo,
Wisdom from this pink flamingo,
Standing on a single stone
In the water, all alone,
He taught me how he found his power
While he mourned his missing flower
Otis had me quite impressed
I saw a light inside his chest
It kept a time to be withdrawn
And miss a lotus that was gone
How it hurts when moving on
All that weight of pain in him
Didn’t break his will to stand
So he stood upright and planned
How to carry all this weight
Made the choice to acclimate
Raised his light to bright from dim
While balanced on a single limb