Imagine wasting spring days jaundiced,
brooding, noting how magnolia petals
from tree nuptials became fulsome
brown slurry, mucilaginous, underfoot slippery
And all Americans, scout-like, ready at any moment,
have cars built to transport a casket—
their neighbor, the sudden hearse of their president
And when an elderly couple rushes riverside,
a great flooding of light makes surreal
all red taillights, neon signs,
sheer gold siding of an office building,
turning oil tanks into desert spectacles
They think it’s a landing of E.T. spaceship,
a redemption, something to heal
this psyche-shredding moment.
And then it rains – then the sun slices –
the carnival with a sneering grin.