State Fair
When the days shorten
and the nights lengthen,
the yellow lotus leaves
rain on the patio day and night.
And in this time, the Naked Ladies
ask to be called Amaryllis Belladonna
and quit blooming.
This is the time of the harvest bounty,
beautifully displayed
in the Farmers' Market.
Backpacked students
trudge to school.
Thus starts the black mourning
for summer.
Winter's first feints are mild
and merely telegraph
the knockout punch.
Then a bribe to avoid black panic.
The State Fair is offered as
a comma between bright and bleak.
A bright smorgasbord
of entertainment
to make 45,000 people
smile and live for the day.
For 50 years, not a missed Fair
each year always the same.
First stop, the Merry-Go-Round
where there is never a frown,
and children smile
in appreciation and anticipation.
Parents laugh
as cameras snap.
Up and down
and round and round.
No one is ever sad at the carousel.
Miles and miles
of kitchen gadgets.
Mop the floors with no effort.
Shine your glasses and shoes.
Chop your vegetables
and cook with no water.
Buy a belt, a hat or
a solar panel.
Sign up for this or that.
Everywhere the prattle
of the barker.
Same merchandise, same spiel,
new barker.
Practice at loud deception,
a perfect vita for
TV news positions.
Double gold, best-of-show wine tasting.
Once in a life-time,
so buy, try and enjoy!
Vet students' animal nursery,
laughing children
and sleeping sows.
Goodbye to this happy Brigadoon
with a ride on the overhead trolley.
Down there on the ground --
45,000 smiling faces.
Forgotten for the moment,
cancer, foreclosure, death
and divorce.
The coming winter can be tolerated.
Doug Minnis
November 2008
21