the poet's junkyard

This sign was on I-480 just down the street from my parents' house. I must have been a morbid kid because once I figured out it wasn't for a real amusement park, I still thought it was really cool, even if some of the lights had burned out or been shot out.

The sign pointed not to a nuclear playground of doom but a junkyard where a couple guys from my parents' church worked and where the local poets once read their works at night under the neon among the rusting cars. Sometimes I feel like I was born too late and missed out on so much. I want to make a pilgrimage someday to this place I drive by more than weekly.


The sign is gone, and its creator now resides in New York City. I hope against hope that it returns to where it once was.