Where, Deferring to No One

From a motel across the Potomac
I survey my country’s façade, its superego,
the archives of its intentions.
Reveries of liberty, equality, justice
hover about the monuments, the commons.
 
Both houses of Congress are on television.
 
Meanwhile, I say to the traffic on the bridges,
things are what they are in the Ozarks,
in the cafes of Tempe and Chapel Hill,
in the Beautiful Asia Market in Detroit,
 
where earnest fables roam the neighborhoods,
marketeers cajole and simper,
the fields, the gardens wish to be left alone,
time has not explained the soul,
 
where, deferring to no one,
the culture evolves by happenstance.

Oliver Rice | Mudlark No. 41 (2010)
Contents | With a Six-Shooter on the Chisholm Trail