23 CANDLES

I'm riding the bus
between
rice paddies
and pachinko parlors.
their surfaces
shine like diamonds
powdered by
nuclear suns.
outside my window,
a heavy hauling-truck
rumbles past
and i effortlessly visualize
it plowing through
the thin skin of this side
of the bus, and each of us
in this line of seats
softly breaking
into colored smokes,
like 23 candles
beneath a few breaths.
conversely, i feel no
confidence to imagine
what the woman
on her cellphone
on the sidewalk
is talking about.


(poem and images by Jerry Gordon)