we knew the museum closes at five and yet, we insisted on having that last cocktail-dry and dirty--at half past four in this open air cafe'. sprigs of afternoon summer light punching the yet lightly clouded sky. we reasoned, all this light was "as good"-that's how we said it-as, perhaps, the exhibit. and surely we missed it. all we saw, as we peered through the locked glass door, was this young museum guard freeing from the confines of his banded mesh cap, his young crop of locks, its tips tincted in intimations of gold or the yellow of virgin corn hair. the tedium of his job was just a memory. already. every time he brazenly stared at the moon face of his watch, it felt like any moment now, godzilla would spring out of the radioactive ocean it had been estivating in. but no worry there, the young man was ready. the dark blue folding chair he was about to part his ass from, without a hitch, would transform as slickly as a superamped anime robot into one supersonic jet flying him out of this nuclear holocaust of ennui, its fuselage spitting out cute, trippy, joyful, but never horrifying, mushroom clouds.
