0278 Scenario Poem by Michael Shepherd

This disgusting August day
so hot and sticky that the sweat can't sweat,
your collar and cuffs a wet grey grime,
the sunlight graceless through the concrete cliffs,
the shade no shade but fetid oven,
the street signs almost too tired to communicate
and faces too tired to be human,

in a squalid room up there
best left undescribed
and a lifestyle defined by its trash can,
some young guy
is putting words together

which on a day like this but
a few years the other side of despair
and an uncaring world
will make you loosen your tie
with a jaunty Sinatra hand,
tip your hat back on your head, execute
a Gene Kelly sidestep on a dancing sidewalk,
swivel your hips like Fred Astaire,
turn and smile and grab her close,
step out step in step,
Broadway wrote it just for you.
life couldn't be better, here and now,
you're part of it, it's part of you,

it's all in the music.