SOME KIND OF APRIL SOME KIND OF MAY

6. SOME KIND OF APRIL SOME KIND OF MAY:

It was some kind of April some kind of May and the flowers were growing on the lawn and the trees had already brought forth the leaves of Summer as the boys in the charthouse band had taken the stage in the little Victorian Park bullshit bandshell the town had erected for parties and parades and two guys I watched came out with a barrel and fireworks and the brass band playing Sousa marches was tuning up from what sounded like Hell itself while the crippled mayor and his pablum steeds spouted bromides and platitudes blarney and greed - a good speech it is said has them all mixed in one - but no one was listening as some human cannonball was brought out in E-flat and stuffed into the tube and they lit the fuse as a loud crash ensued - the guy went flying while all in flames and landed thirty yards away dead like a brick and fired up too and they tried to revive him but all the rescue guys were either drunk or in the band - the ribbons came down and the last I'd heard it was some Memorial Day for the record-books : three dead fourteen burned and one retarded kid suddenly brought back to full and clear and precisely-perfect mental health - which I guess wasn't saying much for anyone else.