lingua obscura

textual snapshots of the Afton Apts. at night



Midtown downtempo
summer on the patio

A dash of honeysuckle sends
me somersaulting back to spring

at 43rd Street
when I spent all day at the crosswalk
hypnotized by changing lights and girls
jogging in place

the insanity of so much
beauty becomes inanity

the unwritten headline reads:
Frank's Bus* Has Crashed Into the Art Tenement
Injuring No One -- only you, an innocent onlooker

approaching nighttime at the Aftons
where everything has happened

the trees block all views of the office tower
a patch of sky opens up enough
to let a shooting star squeak through

a student dangles his legs over the balcony
and plays guitar so you don't have to

he whistles to his art-punk friends
huck finns on a concrete river
paddling ever closer to dawn
from all the usual angles

a somnanbulist walks to the gas station
an anbulance drives south on main

its sirens mingle with the violins
on national public radio

while every morning at 4:03
the lone skateboarder rolls by
on his nightly journey to the end
of midtown

10/19/06


*I don't know when or where the legend of Frank's Bus originated, but my friends Red and BWB used to talk about a bus full of pretty girls that would arrive unannounced on campus every spring. The bus was driven by a guy named Frank (hence the name "Frank's Bus). So if all of a sudden one day you noticed a lot of attractive girls walking around wearing tank tops and their hair down you might remark, "Looks like Frank's Bus has arrived."