Route 18 - Field Report

Elizabeth said last night the lake roared like the ocean

I was landlocked under the orange-white solstice moon

Imagine: imagining a place meant to conjure up another

Three degrees of hometown disconnect in my unborn daughter’s room

Take the 18 Bus past the place my grandfather grew up

Before he got out and met a pretty Swede at the Bible college choir

Left his sister wearing saddle shoes in the care of the county

With her forehead covered in electrode glue, as to not disturb the wires

Mistakes were made.

Grind it out: I can see the edges

The parts where the ends start hemorrhaging time and leaking love

Playing wounded so well, we fell like warm breath cooled

A class ring on a chain, the plastic jewel fell out

Got your ghost ghouling all over Milwaukee

Haunting the homes and the factories of captains of dead industries

I’ve been no place with the capacity to hoard shame like us

In the warehouses possessed and left unsold by the city

I was 20 in September in the Windex-dirty book store

And the cathode-green skinscreens were interrupted by the news

And those fuckers stole my story--my American narrative:

My connection, and my star-spangled nudes

Jimmer drew a minty Kool and a nine volt battery

And a pubic pile of grey steel wool

From his jacket on the balcony

He said we fucked up but won’t admit it

Due to endless imperial vanity