Long strips of Summer
curled into commas,
just pauses in time
from way back

when we were kids.

For just a quarter,
we would all

make silly faces,
in a narrow booth,
on a tiny bench.
Squatting behind

a curtain that looked like

high water pants,
crammed in like
human wedgies
for the prize of
4 to six images
stacked in tidy rows
of exaggeration.

Each of our

joyous faces
frozen in

silly poses,
till a tiny red light

and each flash

bid us to switch,
to something even

more ridiculous.

Then eagerly

we would await

endless clicks

and whirs until

that most amazing strip

would fall out into that
little square hole,
just under the

black reflective glass.

With endless giggles

and finger pointing

it was scooped up
and howled over.

till the novelty of it all

was no longer novel.

Later it was cherished
for many years,
as it yellowed and curled
into a comma,
punctuating a point
in our lives,
with four to six
flesh exclamation marks
bent into

crooked grins,
and twisted eyebrows,
from a distant chapter
of our youth.

Like warm taffy

pulled from

a set of spools

holding sweet innocence

to be savored

long after we can

no longer chew.

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©-2002-MFB III Productions

Art~Whimsically Yours Studio