Spilling the Kool-Aid

You can count your blessings 
if you have any
or shut down in the neon haze that invades
the parking lot & changes the way you think about
moonlight rusting at the bottom of a rain puddle

even when it hasn't rained

& the way you might say it your voice
trailing off into the ozone 
& how I follow it there
like those who know or those who don't but wish they did

a block from the beach 
          where the sky sometimes is like
                              a polished spoon 
& the tripped-up sidewalk
conversant with eucalyptus leaves & damp footprints
is often swept with a whisper of tar-streaked sand
not to mention misty catalogs of ocean sunsets

embalmed in vaseline