Stories from L.A.

Table of Contents

• Building
• Why
• Learning Hope
• Avocado
• Somewhere
• Luckier
• Journey
• Making God
• St. Valentine's Wake
• Sand Castles

• One Side of the Story
• An Other Woman
• Theft
• First Street
• Singing Goodbye

• Autumn
• Blue Note
• Chameleon
• Clouds
• Deux Montagnes
• Endings

St. Valentine’s Wake

I am walking to the office,
cool morning, colors muted,
clouded, grey
concrete sidewalk
peppered with dark red,
knocks my brain out of step,
a fearful pause,
not drops of blood afterall,
but rose petals
damp, centers darkening with decay.

February is the month
when hot house flowers
take the stage,
extravagant productions
where they proclaim
“I love you as I am expected to.”
Gold chains are draped
to signify
that the answer to “be mine”
was affirmative.
And boxes of chocolate
feed the dreams
of love everlasting.

But the clock ticks forward
and the resplendent red flowers
coddled and coaxed
to produce blooms
expensively, out-of-season
droop, drop their petals
where I find myself standing,
relieved that the sidewalk
bears evidence, not of life ebbing,
but of symbols decaying.