"february sidewalk satori"

february sidewalk satori

these dormer windows, the afternoon sun’s flash
splashing across their eyes. the sidewalk’s impassive
at any rate, despite a crazy quilt of house colors looked at
asquint, and bare gnarled cherry boughs.

the young woman, lavender wool cap askew, walks
a black lab, who has other ideas entirely. the girl on the bike
calls in Spanish to the boy steering a kick scooter over
chalk hearts and flowers and cracked pavement.

the half moon’s a silver parachute, it goes without saying,
and six people with plastic shopping baskets mingle
in the market amongst eggplants and egg cartons and
an actual vinyl lp playing Bob Dylan.

you might be asleep: lilac purple of early crocuses,
plaid-coated plywood clown, paint-chipped, in a garden;
how moss shimmers like seaplants atop a stone
retaining wall, the couple returning from the café,

their coffee in red to-go cups, camellias blooming on a
front yard across the way beside the birdbath.
you count the steps you take. history is always like this,
in motion in increments along this sidewalk.


A.K. Barkley
© 2013


Image links to its source on Wiki Commons
"Street Landscape" - Mikheil Bilanishvili (1901-1934)
public domain