10/17/03

A high school pal, now local restaurateur,
Twirls in a pdf a serving-tray.
The resolution isn’t very good.
You see the background, not the face.

They specialize in surf ‘n turf
While the ocean washes the curb.
In waves the tourists pass the picture-windows.
The menu hasn’t changed much.

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How often the children surpass me.
They know codes I can’t even find.
The florets of their tiny logics
Are stanched and cut by their overlords
in long, deep-pocketed coats.

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As a boy, my handwriting was crooked
And my teacher wanted to straighten my back-slant
With an iron maiden. She wore the floral dresses
of the Depression and claimed that those who wished
to walk downstairs were lazy. From the sarcasm
of my blue-collar father I defended myself
with conspicuous disdain, and the children
picked on me for being short-sighted, my eyes
too close, and for my bad performance in gym.

But in the farmers’ fields I talked to God
And later earned an engineering degree. I cast it away
With the first storm after I cursed him.
They say I shine like someone isolated,
My natural exuberance at cross-purposes with my awkwardness.
Revelation doesn’t fill you up. It’s fire either way.
Must I be so close to this double-edged sword?
The perfume and mothballs in my mother’s closet reassured.