It is 1966, the day the earth stood still. Like an old fashioned watch. Perspiring glass. Cogs and fly wheels. Kerosene and liquid oxygen hail down through the rarified atmosphere. Electrodes coming out of dark linkages. Fearful symmetry. Earth and color. Lunar dust. Temperature extremes. metal shards of exploded engines seep from hidden volcanic activity. permafrost into scalding geysers. 10,000 years wide. Astronaut loaded in space. Dark cosmos. Valles Marineris. Via radio transmission. Its radar invisible. Ignominious failures waived from a hilltop. Burning engine bells. Shrieking winds. Undulating glass as earth tried pulling it back. Moving moon. Long before past out of the world. Without boundary. Unhindered despite. Manhattan frame. Last entry. As if to claim space. Sideways. Spaces. Between fantasy. Arching out. Light penetrating. Anything lingering. weakening. replica after replica. To the vanishing point. infinitely discardable. Stumbling through taboo dissolved. The light of two hours passed. As if enchanted. Blowing away in the summer breeze. Hopelessly lost in the fog. Over time, covered in quicksand. Unalterable memory. Suspended animation. A reconstruction hardwired. And loneliness. An expectation of something without a shape or name. Like an afterimage. Ill horse. Dying in a California rest resort. They're watching. Let them bleed. Absent friends obscured by silhouette. Leftovers. Damp plaster and stained mattresses. Leaving only indelible shadows. Entangled in my ropes. echoes. Hail beige. A flicker of white at the edge of my vision. Bland. Toneless. Fallen. Gently. Effortlessly. Moonlight before a rain. Blurring the outlines. Obliterating color. Thick atmosphere. Paper thin. M'aidez I repeat. Shining the simulated sun. Into the darkness within. Or else, the light.