slowly the drizzle fell looking up at the amethyst sky i thought of my mother the swallows on the side of the bridge in their mud nests and the Cap out at the People’s Café upsetting as the day was my pencil’s lead broken a scraped knee and a love affair uncontrolled what my blood stream craved was beyond the reach of angels squinting at the stop signs i charged ahead at medium speed fearing that i had missed “A Summer’s Night Dream” the little puckish girl let me in to the crowd of on lookers and she asked for my ticket but it was Falstaff i was looking for
Atwater Village
July 4, 1981
in the grocery cart you find the frogs down by the river
bending in the light to where
the Pacific Bell poles rot at the bottom
in the creek where all the vagrants pee
it’s not lady like to see those things
but i guess i can learn faster to just look
lucidity in their feet as the cops roll bye quietly
looking at the river grounds
“shut up shut up shut up!” the mantra of the
prophetic invisibles fighting to stay in the
black hole
by the river Frog-town groans and the little fire fluffs
spark here and there like in Gustav’s serpents
but Chavez’ Ravine bullies the twilight with a salute to
the liberation on the fourth
and we are all out of innings
