Watching the twang of America
on T.V. nipping at the heel chords,
the tendons, the porous
ruins of a Country’s bones,
the Coup
the busts of Con-
federates in the Rotunda,
not a culture,
but a filter, Dis-
stilled and Dis-
gusting
white lightning,
blustering, cowering
at the distant
thunder that awaits.
But we say this
in whispers,
in the bubble
of our living rooms,
in the fragility
of being witness,
our bodies infected,
our senses dulled,
eating Georgia peaches
from a can,
from the couch,
until
there’s that twinge,
that faint sweetness
of hope
on the tongue –
and we sit together
you and I,
confused
and weeping.