Boxes Before Nebraska

(Re tiny box-like homes lining the west side of South Bundy Drive, north of Nebraska Street, in West LA) The soiled feeling comes not From the indignant paradise Scurrying past their frontal lobes It arrived in silence Borne of being first to the party And the ensuing, deafening wars With the partycrashers With their cranes Their progress Their eclectic sense of Civilized degradation Squeezing the life from The Boxes Before Nebraska That modest set of Stoic pre-war cookie-cutter domiciles Perfectly groomed Impeccably aligned For Ozzie and Harriet, and Their silent parade of nasty The Boxes, they struggle To remain relevant in the haze of Modernity's hammer and Banality's autoimmune disease To avoid temptation as The developer's succulent lips and larceny Get wider and wetter To simply let be amidst the swollen busy Not to mention a new cast of characters to contend with: - The brackish bendejo careening in stride, unaffected by the Boxes' sidewalk's ill-timed permanence and oblique conundrums, left from quakes and lashings of yore - The livid madman embracing his next lethal dose of humanity as he marches, barks and feuds with phantom nemeses camped out at the Boxes' doorstep - The ragged cougar across the street, squeamish exterior gone bad, pounded into Angelino submission by the tricks and spells she conjures and endures - The dual threat of LA Fitness night trolls, basking in cardio vampire glow, while the next morning's brew of rainbow children percolates into G-d's bitter latte, sipped cupless on fresh asphalt. And yet...they stand Together as one By accident By stupor of justice By de jure By no better place to go Testament to legacies Begging to remain Living proof that Bounty, modesty and sanctity Can be achieved When you stop thinking outside of the box. (4/11/15)