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The Way Down / Decent From Matsuyama Castle/ 2008

Unable to imagine attempting the steep descent before me;
I furtively follow a turquoise topped Canadian cabinetmaker 
and her Aussie friend discuss a chair lift down?
With a grumble and groan 
I realize there must have been a chair lift up!

After one aborted boarding of the lift
Pay, pay, one had to pay!
Where to pay? How to pay!
Ahhhhhhh, here silly Gaijin, pay here!

I grab the circling chair; hold tight to my “go bag”
and clamber to the seat.
And away we go. Echoes of Jackie Gelson!
I watch the wee ones whoosh and bounce by
swinging their stocking covered legs
adjusting their baseball caps “Go Tigers!”

“Take me out to the ball game wheedles its way
into my frontal lobes 
The lyrics printed on the wall of a building 
beside the train station (in English)
running pell-mell from mind to hum.

The lifted landed me with a running stop.
within an atrium on the top floor of a modern building.
Somewhere?
Oopps.

Copyright © | Year Posted 2009




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