There are buildings you’ve never seen before

with

cats lounging in windows,  curled in improbable shapes around potted plants, snoozing with one eye open under wind chimes, their fuzzy cheeks pressed against half drunk cans of soda pop.

There are streets you’ve never walked down before

lined with pastel colored cars and brightly colored garbage cans parked on the curbs where they silently fight for space on sidewalks much smaller then the ones at home

and

squeezed between brick and wooden houses and markets with decals of dancing fruit and children eating ice cream on their glass doors

are

little diners named after Mothers and Grandfathers and sometimes dogs that have  chickens and alligators or maybe fish painted on the windows.

Don’t pretend like you know where you’re going

as you stroll by the cats, the diners, the markets, the parked cars

don’t walk with the swagger and squint of a seasoned traveler, the wily  explorer who has scaled the  pyramids or cruised all of the  Seven Seas years ago on a dare.

Put the phone away, delete the app, it’s okay

to

take a wrong turn

to not know where this road leads and that road ends

So

don’t

close your eyes,

don’t take a breath

Jump right on in

the

water

is

fine.

Na/GloPoWriMo :It Begins Day 2- For our first (optional) prompt, let’s take our cue from O’Neil’s poem, and write poems that provide the reader with instructions on how to do something.