Solara 36-50

 In honor of organized labor's contributions and the federal holiday, here's more Solara.

XXXVI

give me that/old time, sweetness/give me that/yesterday’s concern/give me that/my reverie in sepia/give me that/four corners of my dusty, childhood home-a visit like it’s still the same/like nothing changed/give me that/hope that doesn’t ebb away with the erosion of the time stream/give me that/time back that I’ve been missing-where it’s kept/that sealed off room/untouched by light/airtight/take me there/take me to what I’ve been missing/

XXXVII

another night watch/another night where the air isn’t even moving/trees hang-dog/just waiting/water at a stand still/mosquito baby making music/conditions are perfect/placid/in reverie/waiting for the door to open/for a light to turn on/for a sign of life/we’ve waited long enough/me/you/the amorous bugs/none of us doing anything with any feeling/not anymore/but we’ll wait out here/all night if we have to/just me and the void/nothing to it/nothing else to be done about it/no, sir/

XXXVIII

given the circumstances/the way the evening has taken shape/dusk turning to absolute menace/even the trees are snarling/fog rolled in and rang like a school bell tone/operational inadequacy/all the lights become a torch/become a tongue of fire/nobody is speaking any longer, so they wait/settling in/unused/rusty/given these circumstances/one might consider the evening walk postponed/

XXXIX

behold, Excalibur/resting in this broken asphalt/left to wonder near the uneven street/torn by years of misuse/next to the old, older warehouses long since scavenged for copper/long since forgotten in the office christmas card rush/behold, the sword of Damocles/splitting wood in an urbane home three blocks north/long since forgetting where it comes from/its roots/in the cement of our early days/the wrong tool for the right job/always/

XL

if it’s skate or die, I know which one I’m choosing/bury me in under that half pipe though/I want to hear those clanking wheels in heaven/doing spins and the shouts of failure/excitement/let the scrapes and blood mingle with my body’s memory/let the rodents say a few kind words/I’ve been worthy of their dignity/you can’t imagine the fun that is to be had/not here/not now/not ever/but you’ll try just the same/fixing your deck and your trucks/changing the wheels out in my memory/the future passed me by, brother/

XLI

we’re approaching a place where physics are losing meaning/shapes bend and warp and distort and melt and expand and balloon and twist and collect and fracture and reform and combust and germinate and implicate and extricate and coagulate and we are all watching/stunned/silent in the beauty of the moment’s changing/ 

XLII

what I wouldn’t give/to you/to see the way the the light glints off your shadow/as you depart/in the majesty of this clear summer day’s gradual descent to a quiet evening/I’ve never loved so easily/never been awash in splendor like this before/you/you could be/just another satellite/marching towards the distance/a place to note my location/remaining/at rest

XLIII

Some two bit painter/an eye on less than blatant forgery/took a google image and put it next to his easel/inspiration, he said/it was true/the picture was indeed inspiring/down to the palette of colors/the shift of the subject/the day becoming night/I suppose/imitation is a game/imitation is easily confused with inspiration/and the crowd reacted accordingly/applauding in a crude imitation of the one who stood first/effusive/bold/thunderous claps of the hand becoming a storm/

XLIV

one day/god will assert himself from the wordless void/perhaps as a large hand/maybe a single leg with a wide open eye/communicating through blinking/blinking the masses to an understanding of a beautiful truth/maybe, he will also be a great tap dancer, though it would be more like artful dancing/one day/we’ll all know the truth about existence/and the majesty of song/and see the way we die in an unblinking eye, clouding over with the sadness of another memory in an infinite well/ 

XLV

this high wire horror show/at work/something haunting/something unnatural/moving with a grace unfitting/the stakes being what they are/must-see entertainment/we look away in performative disgust/instinct/moving on instinct/life and the turns it takes/each a pirouette and an axle/the stakes being what they must/another spectacle/another shake of my head/another denial of my own hideousness/look at be cleansed/ 

XLVI

you knew it/you knew it/you knew it/then you did it/anyway/let the consequences of your action filter upstream/into the tributaries and the overflow basin/you should have done better/you should have done better/you should have done better/instead we’re left with this/strong sense of disaster/cleaning up the mess you’ve made for the rest of us/while you just sit there/watching with those hollow eyes of yours/blank expression/thank you for this/sincerely/

XLVII

We’ll put this on a shirt/print it everywhere/it’ll catch like a match to dead forest/practically sells itself/practically, but with a little help from the internet/from the wild/from the former and the latter/people will see it and think of a great peace/others will see the calamity and know it as their own/others still will just think it will look radical if they wear it on a hooded sweatshirt they overpaid for/there’s levels/and there’s levels/and this is just one of said levels/we’ll be up to our nose hairs in money/swimming pools filled with it/God/I am so ready/

XLVIII

Noble majesty/come back to me/in visions of steam/in the mist of a morning/fresh and aware of the cooler breezes/lost among the dew/trampled over kindling/the life cycle of these whispering woods/at last/a champion worth our waiting/lumbers forth/in a pairing with another/just as willing/equal in each way/let the steam drift right off of them as their forms come into/focus/patient/even gazes/a sentry/another safeguard/returning to stand watch over something sacred/

XLIX

I’ll be direct/the future terrifies me/the changes morphing into new trends/language augmenting itself/modern art in general/fashion, oh fashion: recycled or otherworldly/world I know molting/who knows what will wait for me/for you too/as the sun becomes something it was not meant to become/as the rest of us drink even more expensive and alarming caffeinated beverages/snack on freeze dried delicacy/dressed like astronauts, maybe/I’m shaken at the very idea/

L

dressed up/for another performance/one woman show/avant garde diner/another vision of a future society deserves/less imagination than previously expected/all flash/substance in a vacuum/substance as a commodity/unblinking/unafraid/the world comes undone/remade/in clean ribbons/shredded and left to the wind/behind a still-life form/bowing at the conclusion of another performance/