James Walton # 106 A once in a hundred years

Event. The wind has its

voice. Trees are in the freeway.

Roller derby shove, then sky

Araucana. Shifting technologies

run for explanations. Rain says

I hold you all, I hold nothing.

They’re singing Joni Mitchell.

Five women. The Concert Hall

a Ferris wheel. Holding on

O Canada. Grip for the road

a river to skate away on.

And we’re falling, into words.

There’s a moment transcribed.

Woodstock. She plays the air

in vocal trapeze. The audience

a mirror of peeping hearts, palms

half a million strong. Feathers

on the winter night. Getting back.

Traveling, traveling, traveling.

Home. Out of the city, humming

Big Yellow Taxi as we come

to the bridge a truck has gone over.

Oh, I could drink a case of you darling

and I would still be on my feet. Always

as long as a life as short as a century.