PIKE STREET MARKET

                 — from a photograph

A smiling Japanese woman
leans into the camera lens
holding her right hand up to the sky
never dreaming she was a waitress
offering the belly of a lavender fish
swimming in a billboard sunset
with neon green lettering like scales
pointing the way to the next fishy bar.
Her head blocks the "et" in Market
so it reads Mark, in tall red letters
as in X marks the spot or maybe
she's waiting for ET to phone in for sushi.
As the sun sinks over her shoulder,
hanging from the fishmonger stalls,
small fairly lights like the braille ellipsis
of an unfinished thought lighten
the end to a perfect day in Seattle.
Perhaps she was thinking of a sushi sunset
done up in salmon and pale wasabi stars.

4/29/09