This musing was mix of walking through San Francisco at night on a way to a party after my children and wife had gone to sleep. Those are the main ingredients. Oh, also add the morning after rain.
Streets are wet but
the sun is shining.
Around the corner the remains remain,
as they do.
Shopping carts and yelling
incoherent anger blended with despair.
But not so far away, 20 feet,
business is thriving.
In the darkness before now
the rain poured on us all.
I was asked twice or more for money.
In the seedy, the seeds can grow.
Or the new gentry can
take risk. Over time,
the cure of all ills,
there is no risk.
But for the short,
which is ours, there
will be spoils for some
and riches for few.
And so still I was walking.
There was a bus full of promise.
There were the affluent
and the non-invited.
Concrete and steel, the time’s decor,
show affluence still.
Many are drawn, I am.
For as long as I can span, I am drawn too.
But the return was fraught
with public transport.
A sure grounding in the reality of
human suffering.
Some expound the joys of commonality,
others revile. I watch with
eyes half open.
The time was short again. And this led to now.
As it always does.
Supposedly on the way to forever.
Humans, myself will never see forever.
We may be in the ever
for now.
With children though, a parent must plan.
And care, and toil, and boil
and guide the disciple
through all of this.