Midwestern Elegy
Everything in July is heavy; the air
with moisture, the sun on tall prairie grass.
Crickets groan in mounds of straw.
Two sandhill cranes hover above the sleepy marsh,
and dandelions blow across freshly sealed asphalt.
American flags hang from white porches, motionless,
with the sound of a lawnmower in the distance.
Every person looks to a horizon that leads nowhere.
They watch clocks, twiddling their thumbs.
There are no castles, no ancient monuments—
only parking lots, gas stations, and automatic doors.
I watch a little girl with pigtails,
her palms and knees are cut up from gravel.
A car speeds away without looking back.
I watch a teenage girl on the shore
of Lake Michigan, trading ideas with the wind.
I hold her leather journal, tracing the edge
of it, submerging myself to its bottom.
I hand her a towel, and buy her a scoop
of rainbow sherbet. Under the perfume
of waffle cones, I sit with her and listen.
She describes places she’s never been,
with a magical gleam in her eyes.
She recites a list of all the things
she has learned to live without.
She asks me, where do
the people in the mirror go?
I tell her to gather them at the shore
with a wry smile. Then, tenderly,
she will return them to her home.
A Candle. A Grave. My Grief is Unspecific.
Down the road, someone has turned on a single light. My friends sleep below the surface in
rows. Their heads are on silk-lined pillows, rocking steadfastly into the night. Persons to
tombstones. Limestone to a fading script. Fragments into bluegrass. The weeping willow chimes
like a clock striking. I watch the wind ripple through the bluff, full of sound. The dull flicker of a candle is like a reminder. They are blown out. Gone, I say. My breath, a feeble sermon. Yes, I am
their unlikely captain, traveling faster. Clusters of stars emerge in the sky, some are older than
this galaxy.
Nothing rests in a cemetery. They are not resting. I hear them as they laugh, shaking the ground
with their bellies. They are drunk on their own creation. I hear the faint sound of clapping hands.
Out, Out. I exit to the sound of a furious ovation.
