Five-sense reality or silk-screen illusion,
symbols of boyhood to manhood confusion.
White picket fence of self-built seclusion,
solitude of the sleeping village delusion.

At the feet of a sprouting mountain spring,
showered by the mist of a geyser,
I linger upon finger painted meadows,
astonished by pallet knife brush strokes.

The canyon’s canvas explodes with sudsing streams,
bursting with stain-glass bubbles.
The sunset squeaks at the top of the stairs,
then slides backwards down the bannister .

Where is nature’s prism
upon this Morse code of buckled turnpike tar?
The summer sky is oiled by clouds that are
fumed gray by the exhaust of civilization.

Beyond a twilight haze, I strain to see one star.
Behind a black frozen shawl of grease and steel,
beneath graveyards of junk and stench,
lays nature’s hidden pinwheel of color.

Quickway fallen rock zones are now in cages.
Catskill hotels have no guests.
Abandoned bungalow colonies are condemned.
Kaplans is boarded and closed forever.

Middletown, NY
September 1992

Design by Richardet Design: Webdesign und Grafik