Liberty

 

Sordid loose leaf recollections
            scatter from the bridge.
The car is waiting
            slowly rusting.
Where can we go?
            Further in,
supposing that we never stop
supposing that you win.

 

So long, city of heat
            bread baked streets
            muffled beats.
So long to the long despised
            to the never loved
            to the never to be loved.
You've closed your heart, O America
            I've closed my eyes.

 

No longer will I pass among the throngs
to sun myself beneath the smog.

 

I'm not one to worry
            the alarmists do that for me.
What have I to leave behind
            but pseudo-revolutionaries
            that stand for nothing?

 

Bumbling Bible-belt atrocities
            I know your gods can never love me
            I never knew them
                        but based solely on what you've told me
                        they seem like jerks.
So, so long, you have not saved me
            but merely pointed out the mortal danger
            of one thinking for oneself.

 

The sky is wrapped around the freeway,
            the world, a safe dark space to lay my head.
You've spent all day picking up the pages
            that I tore in two (and three and four…)

 

Long have I been longing
            for a home that cannot be built.
I am "home in the wind", she used to tell me,
"like a tumbleweed."
I guess that's why it was all so easy
            brief goodbyes and no apologies.

Truck stop card games and their fringes:
            Are you serious? Keep going.
            Where can we go?
                        Further in.

 

So long, footless masses,
            the elastic waisted wasters.
So long carbon copies
            the petroleum blooded
            the white-hooded.
You've closed your heart, O America,
            I've closed my eyes.

 

No longer will I fight to breathe
or have to drive to see a tree.

 

I'm not one to worry,
            the alarmists do that for me.
What have I to leave behind
            but suburban sterility?

 

Contagious complainers compare issues of the day.
            Two coffees and a window seat,
            I've never seen this place before, 
                        realizing Hopper's brushstrokes;

 

The toothless waiter refers to himself
            in third person
 but by a name that is not on his nametag.
            Maybe he isn't referring to himself at all.

 

So, so long Casper and your waiter friend.
            I hope you find yourself
            where you found yourself first,
            someday.

 

The sea is wrapped around us
            the sands of time stick to our feet.
There are no dead-ends
            only turnarounds.

 

Somewhere near the border
of someplace and another,
We met a prophet of profit
            who wore a ten-gallon hat
            and was good for a laugh.

I called a few to tell them
that we were still among the living.
I didn't tell them where we were
 because I didn't really know.

 

Clever cupid played some tricks
            underneath my eyelids
driving down rural interstate
            wheat bending in the breeze.

 

So long crazy cowboy capitalist
            with green eyes filled with money.
So long simple settling
            wasting and waiting

for some magic spark.
You've closed your heart, O America
            I've closed my eyes.

 

No longer will I see a plastic pink flamingo sunset
to hear Fall Friday battle cries.

 

I'm not one to worry
            the alarmists do that for me.
What have I left behind
            but the glass cut sadness eluded to in family trees?

 

So, so long moonlit tirades.
So long prefab fantasies.
So long adolescent prison
            bars and chains and forgotten heritage.
You've closed your heart, O America
            I've closed my eyes.

 

The wind cannot be found on a map, Liberty,
            still it is my home and my home only.
I can share it,
if you swear it will be kept between the whole of us,
            I screamed "So long!" off a bridge
            a long time ago,
I have yet to look back.

Reviews

[N. Dolby]

Very, very beautiful . . . I really liked it.

"I'm not one to worry
the alarmists do that for me."

I really like this part

[Wsn Radio On Writerscaf..]

Thank you so much for submitting this piece into our contest! :)

[Coral]

Very beautiful....I love it!