Wednesday, October 18, 2017

Oakland Outsider









Street surrealist
drive-by


The Berkeley Flaneur
morphs into another avatar
the Oakland Outsider

Viewed askance
by some natives
as a stranger
who gets stranger
by the hour

1.
Wild bird attrition caused
by greedy stupid
architecture



Bird killer
façade


Obstructing the flight path
from the hills and the estuary
to the Bay


It's really just a façade too
a narrow corridor rooms
stacked up to the sky


A drastic fall off


An Escher-like maze
reflective and deadly
for avifauna


Latest casualty


I've also recovered
a hummingbird
who met then same fate



2.
Vehicular manslaughter




Scan your fingerprints
into the Matrix





A Mercedes jeep
how gaudy and absurd



One has little choice
look at Jacko



Ram tough truck
with trailer


Oakland Zoology


The Illuminaries stash
of painting supplies
City-sanctioned muralists
with execrable taste



Hunky Harley-Davidson
looks like a '58 Chevy
from the back




Smoke of the wildfires
colors the sky,
A motorized tall ship
heads out to open water



I'm about ready for
a Tequila sunrise


Theatre of cruelty
of the absurd
Insane clown president


Secretly
hope this potable water
supply will come
to someone's rescue





3.
Children's Fairyland
Exposed




The approach has been in disarray
lots of street construction




The Children's Fairyland
 Adults
accompanied by children
only


Let's see if
I can sneak inside









A book or a screen is one thing,
But the ability to sit and ride on
 Alice in Wonderland characters
Now you're talking
 a kid's language







It's a strange enough place
a patch-work quilt
of a child's imaginings







Rabbit loiters
on his day off
Closed Monday









The live oaks
in their fantastic forms
amplify the fantasy here
like very few other
amusement parks









Little kids love it here--
no scares even on
Halloween









They changed her race
The Old Lady Who Lived in a Shoe
into a dark-skinned lady
Sort of courts the stereotype--
"so many children
she didn't know what to do"



Slowly gradually
the wildfires are
being contained

We still must endure
the insidious smoke







Let's pretend
It's a happy ending



As they say in
East London









Topiary dragon
did inhale
smoking still







Smokey phantasms
camp followers
of the Northern wildfires





October 2017





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