Sonnets

Context — I’ve long had a ritual of sitting alone in the late evening and looking up at the sky or stars to unwind just before going to bed. While sitting on my roof this evening, surveying Haight Ashbury’s houses, I had a think.

With ground-lit darkness hiding all the proof
of stars, I pondered, why the gable roof?
It stood beside its replicas, as bouffe
would make of Painted Ladies, locals’ spoof.
It snows not where we are, so why align
the angles such that topmost floor’s confined?
Metropolis could use a more benign
and spacious warehouse structural design.
Yet all the places seen in neighborhood
use paneling, trim, girder, roof of wood
as if it through both fire and earthquake stood,
like local history’s misunderstood.
And yet, despite curmudgeon’s rationale,
the Haight’s quixotic pledge boosts my morale.