-how we come and go-

the lightbulb above my head blew-out last night

as I thumbed through pages of photos taken from

a long-in-print, but long out-of-print, monthly magazine.

there was barely a noticeable pop when it blew

with no downward glistening of sight and sound

such as we've witnessed with historically intriguing

slow-motion film experiments, and there was little time

to react to the sudden darkness, as light was snuffed

almost as fast as the speed of itself. 

(there’s a photograph of "Yippie" leader, Jerry Rubin

from the civil unrest of another time, taken by Richard Avedon,

who also photographed the Beatles, Dovima with the Elephants,

Twiggy, and a captivatingly forlorn Marylin Monroe.)

In the Avedon proof Jerry looks dry, disheveled,

he smokes reefer, but–– 

years later I saw him in passing; a more polished,

closed-form Jerry, dressed-up, neatly trimmed and chatty, walking

with undergraduates north on Oakwood in Ypsilanti, Michigan.