The Ever So Gentle Parachute Landing on the Elysium Planitia of Mars

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The city
My heart
Is knocked for six
Silent as a chapel of rest
After business hours.

Buildings
Stand stony-faced
As solemn
As the dust bowl faces
Captured by Lange

There’s no hustle
No bustle
No hoy 
No polloi

There’s only fallen Starbucks
The occasional baffled dog
Azaleas born unattended
Suddenly orphaned art
And ghosts waiting in the wings
Listening for their cue
Which is who we all are right now
Ready to
Look upwards
Just as we have rehearsed
For months now
For the all-clear flare to 
Suddenly streak across the sky
Like Superman
Which will signal
the return of
The pizza oven slam
The barroom crush
The Louisville crack
The saxophone wail
The taxi cab flurry
The hymnals 
The prayers
The vendors
The hipsters
The know-it-alls
The lost
The found
The wanderers
The free-wheeling ramblers
The cacophonous rumblers
And most of all
The kiss
Which just may complete you like 
The conclusion of a mystery
The final flourish of a brushstroke
Or the ever so gentle 
parachute landing on the
Elysium Planitia of Mars.

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