We drank this city down on foot.
Chasing bridges with colder drinks
Brown bread single-file marionetting
Past every window on Lombard St
And if the Palace of Fine Arts has survived the fires
The earthquakes
The tourists
Then maybe it would have fallen if we hadn't
Loped in throats open eyes up everywhere every filigreed surface
Our substitute for redwoods
These things lift us up.
We talk big here words that burst speech bubbles
Generalizations about this our generation
Madcap comedians, scientists, mourners we become in
Five days, each a line on the staff paper, the Richter register
Where the notes fall into patterns
Trace out routes we wear into sidewalks
(page turn)
Treble clef for sunny days. Minor keys for mist.
We'll hear this music in days months years
After it is sung felt eaten lived chewed because
We're light on our feet and
Not even sound catches up
And now we are fighting with river rocks now we
Read serious things and smile for the understanding
Smelling of gasoline, mesquite sweet and skunky.
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