Random Weird Person

Near river's edge outside the Cafe du Monde,

John Brown sets up his telescope.

It's taller than he is by a foot, and it

probably outweighs him, too.

I sip cafe au lait, wipe powered sugar

from off cheeks and nose,

staring into the darkness of

Jackson Square when a stranger steps

out of the past and into the light of a streetlamp.

Is it the hat, the hair, the long leather coat

the thinness of legs or chest that conjure up

miasmas of floating saloons on the

languid Mississippi?

I'm certain he'll pass through me on

his way to the river, but

first he pauses at the hand-lettered sign for

John Brown's Sidewalk Astronomy.

Come see the rings and moons of

Saturn, it says, but St. Louis Cathedral

blocks the sky, and god has a sneaky way of

always taking his half out of the middle.