we have the truest believers

"we have the truest believers"

in a hushed voice she whispers,

"this is not our America. this was

built by James Dean & Liz Taylor."

in spite of the sun hanging over my

head i am cold, i am frozen, i am

weeping. if i drive down the highway

will i reach my destination or

burn up into dust? fated to become the

Saint of Our American Dream

or "something as equally

important".

in this America,

our hearts abbreviate our emotions.

workers' hands carry short stories;

they are the voice used to capture

the essence of common life. all cuts

& bruises on our bodies are footnotes

in the story of our American lives.

in this America,

we are allowed to burn effigies and

deface our progenitors as a means

to speak, even though all we've said are

arrangements of words pertinent to

ourselves & only ourselves. we are

social thieves, cashing in on the backs

of the cast-offs.

in this America,

our sexualities are hard to judge. we

take lovers the way a candle takes a

flame. men & women stare intently into

the eyes of love & fate & fear. they subtract

rationale in lieu of stuttered, cinematic romances.

those we take lovers are just hardened silhouettes

veiled by apartment windows and fists

thumping on walls in ecstasy or in anger.

then i remembered the truth of it all:

we bleed black blood, but not until after we

sit on a park bench near a river &

breathe in the cool domestic air saying over

& over as the pigeons crowd our legs:

"this is home, this is home".

-----

an unannounced companion piece to Vince Bauter's "Graffiti Westerns."