The Honour of Silence

Slick, winding roads of earth

Valleys fortressed by elegant houses,

some more humble than others.

The pictures scream off of the horizon,

muffled only by the golden hue

Miles and miles of heights;

licking the S-turns,

picking the meat from the country club green.

Little suburb off the 82 that houses a small Medical school.

Idyllic forms of all matter,

the continuum of dreams on a hill,

anointed by god at the very top.

Speckled cars casting shadows from Warrior Rd.

Eyes burning in the dusk of spring

The world changes from Terrace Heights to the sunken city below.

The contrast of grit with a derelict modesty,

broken plains, trees uprooted by sidewalk

Atmosphere smothered by people.

The streets twist and confuse,

All numbers and no meaning

A chaotic puzzle mapped against the grain,

asphalt clothing intersections seeped with bile.

Tombs upon tombs of minute apartments

so many 1/2’s,

Every tenement building sickened by decades of cigarette smoke.

Motels etched in the slums of 1970’s New York, perpetually stuck in time in the Pacific Northwest.

The faces change behind the fences,

the sentiment does not.

The ailing businesses defunct or suffering,

this is disparaged housing

This is survival money blues.

The world below is all shades of red.