Orbiting the Center

 

 

Urban Yuletide
Psycho-geography

of Oakland Center

 

 

 

 

 

The most Christmas sound heard today

Bells tolling from the old time tower 

 

 

From 8th to 18th and back

on an aleatory quest for rolling papers 

 

 

An eye open for Holiday eye-candy

 

 

 

 

City Center somber & deserted

 

 

 

Corporate Christmas 

predominates

 

 

 

 

Incandescent empty space

 

 

 

 

Pandemic measures drag on

 

 

 

 

Line for vaccinations on Xmas Eve

 

 

 

 

Not to be too macabre about it

 

 

 

 

Squad car blinking

outside an eldritch hotel

Must be Santa

 

 

 

 

Mural on the windowless back wall of a building

no doubt were another edifice once stood 

It used to be of a white knight first-responder

I suppose it changes periodically

 

 Front of the same groovy building

like many of them-- occupied by lawyers

 

 

Street tree sky clouds chandelier window 

 Land of ice and even snow

 

 

Blade runners

 

 

 

 People's Republic of Oakland

 

 

 The Sharks

local mob 

 

 

 

Mural of extravagant hands

 

 

 

Screen memory

 

 

 

 

Weird world in here 

 

 

 Weird through and through

inside and out

 

 

 

 

Boarded-up theater

 

 

 

That's Oakland for you

 

 

 

In my naivete

I await a renaissance

 

 

 

 

 

This wasn't always Stinky...

Must have changed hands 

 

 

Here's a humble soul showing good cheer

 

 

 

 

 A swanky uptown tavern

 

 

 

 

 

A delightful and dainty display 

Must be a jewelry store or some such

 

 

 

 

Nothing says Noel

like a study pair of cruel shoes

 

 

 

 It's a refined dildo and porn emporium

Well I'll be

 

 

 

 It's a spiritual thing--

yoga and yabyum

yoni and lingam

the whole jewel in the lotus

 

 

 

 

 

So Ray comes full circle
Scored 3 packs of my preferred rolling papers
gave a guy spare change

Smoked along my route
And finished my last block home
in a brief cloudburst

24 December 2021