Happy

My friends permit me
to straggle._____I adjust

my red silk pocket square.
I take my place

_____behind the crowd
gathered._____I look

where they look.  I know
yet enjoy._____When

the lights die_____a hush
erupts._____The night sky

thronged with piercing stars
obvious now even from

downtown._____We wait
for the show to start.

I remark
to the programmer_____(she stands

at my left) that better than
quadruple redundancy in the case

of spacecraft systems
is quintuple -- better still

is arriving from a different
angle altogether.

Don't shush me;
the show's been on

for eons.