In the time of the cherry blossoms, without warning The sky turns leaden and opens Slurries of western words, driven like snow Swirl through the sullen petals Turning the careful fractal economy of beauty Into sodden masses of pink, run through with Carbon from the exhausts of a million cars. Neon glints in the wet bark, black Beetles scrabble furiously to avoid drowning. A ragged asiatic man reels in the road and ends sitting With a thud against a cherry trunk Blooded by obfuscation. He splays his fingers on the ice-wet asphalt, Palms sliding in the flower flesh Considers speaking, weighing every word A sacrifice against the precision of thought. Instead he is silent, each sweet sentence Receding away unspoken like the long rows Of precisely-planted trees, The fuel of reverie.