The Cone Issue #9 Spring 2016 | Page 11

By Gary David Johnson SONNET COMPOSED UNDER A TREE IN GOLDEN GATE PARK DURING THE CELEBRATION OF THE 40TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE SUMMER OF LOVE (San Francisco, September 2, 2007) Two aging gays lay down in front of me One swept debris from trees he couldn’t clamber and then arranged a tarp… just so. Then he: “Wait long enough, these will be precious amber” he said, and dropped those twigs beside the tree against which I had propped myself. The Show: Those waves of ancient music and the free high from the smoke that flowed from pipes below It’s been four decades since I did this last Forty summers since that summer long ago It’s cliché, yes I know, but passed too fast that time, yet slow enough, I think, to grow Four decades: Almost too long to remember Somehow the same, though now, just shades of amber 11 THE CONE - ISSUE #9 - SPRING 2016 By E. Amato