It was to be his last day, he dreamed, a phantasmagorical dream
recurred, after a cup of coffee, in wakeful brain, a near belief in seizure.
How would he spend his last day? He should limit his options,
if chance proved him a fool tomorrow, build a hedge of porcupines.
But if today’s feeling did not pass, his options were not so limited.
He could fly anywhere, stay in a Six Star hotel in bikinied Marseilles,
fly to romance Rome and get in line for a final Papal blessing,
parachute into the Mojave desert, jump off Saddleback Mountain,
surf the Banzai Pipeline – like in the old days, take the board out.
Who would dare cut off an old man on a wild wave on his last day?
He got his surfboard out of the deep basement, his lovely wife still sound asleep.
He walked down to the bus stop. He waited with his surfboard on the poetic bench,
beneath the ancient acacia tree. The bustling bus came but the discreet driver said no
to his putting the untethered surfboard in the bike rack on the front of the bus.
He went back to waiting at the busy bus stop, and this is how he passed
his penultimate yesterday, talking to bussers about the art of surfing.
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