April's Status Quo of Cruelty

We return for another fillipic installment of Filmore Street photos. We've meandered back into the languid airport waiting lounge. Staring blankly at the flight tracker. All planes are delayed and grounded. The pilot has locked himself in the bathroom. Quiet weeping trickles under the door.

Two elotes splayed on the sand. Like two ash-statues found entwined in the rubble of Pompeii. Kind of romantic if you can get past the initial horror of it all.

A baby's bib. Idly waiting for rivulets of adorable dribble. Dribble that came and went. And when the baby became a man, the bib became a tie. And his innocence was duly cast off aside to the curb.

Once the bringer of clarity and light. With a flick it pitched a room into a warmer and more familiar shade. A flickering candle in a dark abyss. Now in a continual state of "off."

This behemoth once dominated the living room. And held reign over the attention of families after dinner. Now it counts grains of sand on the side of the road. Holding court over squawking crows.

The harbinger of summer. Now faded and belly-up. Like a koi that's finally stopped swimming. Waiting for the gardener to come along and indifferently yank its scaly flank from the clogged filtration system.

A plaster. But alas there's no band-aid big enough to mend the gaping wound of being banished to Filmore Street. Lonely and marooned, this adhesive strip. No one considers that sometimes the healers need the most healing.

Once strong and a symbol of reliability. But now frail and vulnerable. The Golden Generation have been resigned to retirement homes. Pushing checkers around a board. And completing large puzzles. With several missing pieces.

A grotesque grin of zipper. Like it knows. It knows that there's no abandoning your emotional baggage on the side of the road. That will always be awaiting you at your destination. No additional fees for exceeding weight limitations.

The line will always be busy. The paper tray always jammed. And there's no one ever on the other side reading your fax. Gott ist tot.

This string once knew the sweet taste of liberation. Perhaps as a tail of a fancy-free kite. Carried off by the wind at such a speed. Speeds that would've caused our eyes to water with joy. But flew too close to the sun, it did. And now deigned to festoon Filmore with its entrails forevermore.