A Spanner in the Work

First, we drove close down by the river: just to look up at the the truss bridge monolith.

With unbothered eyes, we traced along the interconnecting triangles that criss-cross and distribute mass in motion.

The Parker Truss took the standard triad of members: chords, verticals, diagonals.

But this Parker camel-backs with the upper chord and consists of exactly five segments, not three.

The triad but with a pair of camel humps to top it. Accessorized.

Stressed sometimes with tension, sometimes with compression, and sometimes both, in response to dynamic loads.

“It is almost a full moon?”

---

Untarnished by the rust of daily practicum and edified on precipice and to edge, the bridge is high-sided as though set to plummet.

Just a scaly spanner anchored in a bit of wet water, hydrating ferric oxides on wrought iron.

Reddish-brown-yellow.

A little shunt allowing red-blood cell autos to flow, permitting the heart-engine dry passage so it can cross over, neatly, without going all the way under.

“An old design and cheap.”

“The physics of statics.”

“Fancy way to say that it works, huh?”

---

Then we climbed the steep hill by the river: just to look down on varicose vein highways zig zagging over dirt legs.

Without the clean shave of hot asphalt pressed tight by the compaction of Caterpillars, tires tire along dusty bumps.

Yet, the paved jet-streams below us back up.

Multiple bottlenecks and arterial traffic jams clot the circulation.

Blood pressure rises under this cellular road rage.

---

[ Court etiquette deserves a modicum of decent civility.

Coquette or not, it is not about dress, but language (un)used.

Courters do best by being dumb(founded), but not stupefied, together.

Stupid talks a big game and sings with precious, unnatural affectation.

Dumb keeps quiet and abides.

Until.

Like windows. Still.

Without dressings.

---

My temples tighten, feeling the impetus but not wanting to be too impetuous.

“Good, huh? Can we go dancing now? Kiss hard like we did last time. Get felled and sleep?”

“We came here so you could show me what it was before. The part prior to this now we presently share. So tell it in words out loud.”

---

I wonder at the time:

“I worked hard; so he could get one degree more. I arranged to rearrange. But new arrangements required rearranging. Then a couple of years later, I prepare to rearrange again.

Because when I wanted out of my hometown, the question got asked:

(Good prospects out west.)

He prospected jobs.

Deeds are not always actions. Sometimes just unimbued words.

~

He asked the cashier to break a twenty and change one dollar into four quarters and nineteen into ones.

Automated doors. Artificial wind.

Plunk. Twist.

Black cat.

Pink elephant.

Costume piece with a bit of black cord.

Lost as easily

Release/d

~

---

“Now I remember why we came back.”

“It looks different through new eyes, huh? Let me be charmed.”

Giggles.

~

Then we climbed back down the steep hill by the river: just to flip on the car’s radio, turn on the headlights, and sway. Spotlight dancing on grass while crickets chirp ambiance.