Red stair, green stair, something-in-between stair,
the walk is long and beset by throngs
of things we cannot see.
Clean air, mean air, perhaps distinction isn’t fair –
mysteries permeate and percolate
in the atmospheric dynamo.
Our clocks wind back and forth,
so sometimes the stairways shift
and bring us closer to a new engine.
A loud ka-chunk announces fresh motion,
and this time my rainbow spiral stairway
ascends this makeshift boxy tower.
Some kind of orange-gray sun
shines upon this sea of detritus,
and it pierces my perception
as I step onto the tower’s apex.
A platform waits in the center of the floor,
and I walk into its patient arms.
My new companion shifts downward,
and once I press a big red button,
they take me down into the unknown.
The construction is jarring yet effective,
odds and ends stacked on bric-a-brac
that hold the elevator’s mechanisms quite well.
Down, down, down we go,
to see what may not have been seen.