3rd and Pine

We’re walking past the McDonald’s on the corner

where we can always score

the one even the tourists know to ignore

and we see the same old,

tired,

ragged faces there.

It seems odd that in the midst of all this natural majesty

there’d be such sadness here.

Maybe it’s the rain, like all the jokes say,

drowning us slowly

and flooding algae, dirt, and sewage out

It could be the sun,

the lack thereof,

but Nordic Heritage taught us to stock up on fish oil

I wonder if it’s the way the mountain looms over us,

teasing her crooked smile,

just far enough away to remind us how low we are

Or maybe some part of us is left blistered still,

like the loggers we were before,

rolling our wares down Skid Row.

Whatever it is, it’s reason enough to climb up Cap Hill,

just to wander around drinking half empties off Broadway

and meet up with friends we hate,

smiling because they get us what we love.

I get so sick of it all sometimes,

waking up to swear we won’t do this again,

and then finding ourselves back here.

I don’t know if I hate this city,

or just hate who I am in it.

Either way, I’m ready to damn it all.

But as the morning shakes us out of haze into fog,

we’ll settle past forest onto rocky beach,

and the sunrise on the water

will dance for us

speaking of salmon and orcas and seal

and we remember that if we can numb our feelings,

the sound isn’t so freezing at all.