Electricity from MinuteHand by John Ludington

Down my four flights of stairs
It’s only where I sleep
The world grinds forward, no-one cares
I’m only make believe
The daily crier calls out “liar, it’s all a slight of hand”
And through the market, a disheveled man no-one understands
The impossible is not so far from here
It’s not a trick, I sear it
If there were a way to bring what’s dead to life again
I’d go there and back
The simple minds I leave behind
It’s how each day begins
Ideas and inspired thought flood me as I walk in
My escape, my sanctuary
Electrified and alive
A laboratory filled with men like me discovering the divine
My focus only, heart and mind, trial and observation
Colleagues fall and steer their fate to spectacle and fame
From the spinning glass I watch the static pass
From your hand to mine
In the etherial light they see immortal might
The fleeting gleam of faces
Back up my four flights of stairs all by candle light
The doubtful mass my shadow casts was never meant to last
If when I leave my name may find some passing mention
Oh, let it be known, my true love, the beauty of invention

I lie awake dreaming of what’s still to come
Events I’ll never live to see
Lightning strikes the hearts of men and it changes them
Phenomena forgotten in the race to get the patents
The debtors to the bankers
It arcs out into rhetoric
The wide eyed crowds agape
As the neighborhoods light up one by one
The cities shine like the sun

• Folk
• quirky
• urban
• California