on the banks of the meander

1.

Go! Go listen to the world
on the banks of the Meander river
late some night or early morning

listen to the frogs at sunset
listen to the birds at sunrise
the moon comes up

in the dusk, a sudden silence. A fast car hums by,
a rocket ship of crap, for which the frogs
on the banks of the Meander care nothing

the dawn finds me with the frogs,
naked on the bank
blasted

another day
another postcard-perfect picture
the post office should pay me

the birds take the highway
as the crow flies
the direct line to the Meander

I take the backroads
the doglegs
with the frogs

Go!
Go listen!
On the banks of the Meander:

          The grass, green.
          The life, slow, like the children playing
          in the neighborhood down the street.
          See it!

          The Meander flows past battlefields,
          monuments to the storied dead
          now graffitied by tomorrow’s soldiers
          the tags of aging Kilroys capped by Banksy’s legions

          Watch as it flows past churches
          where the god of guns hold his mass
          celebrates his bloody sacrament
          while self-medicated flags flutter on high

          See it! Flowing past the gated lots,
          walled communities, our voluntary zoos.
          With the birds and frogs
          I stand outside the fence, still naked as

          we gawk together at the rich
          running wild in their native habitat.
          They are not safe to pet.
          Money does not tame this beast.

Move along now
back to the river
back, before we hear the sirens

singing their siren song
of a law and orderly world
where nothing wild waits outside.

Privilege requires the outdoors to be a
safe zone. The rich prefer to keep their
mortal dangers locked up inside with them.

Leave it. Let us leave Dis city, leave them
in their self-made circle, their terror factory,
behind their walls: gated, and policed, and safe.

We will build a raft. Gather branches young and old, grab that
plastic floating flotsam, lash it tight together with ropes
of moonbeams, hempen strands, and hope

and push off! Away from banks and walls, farewell to frogs,
push away the malls and microwaves and rocket cars.
From the middle, the Meander seems suddenly wider on both sides.

Smell! Ah, the river has a scent
all its own, fish and a million years of
slow mud that flows down a million miles

to find us here, watching the banks of the world.
At last it finds us, watching the banks of the world,
here at the last, as they slide north into the past.

We ourselves are motionless
sitting perfectly still on still water
as the world slides on its silent gimbles around us.

The Meander is a theater,
slow and vast, showing us to ourselves
and the tall grass waving

goodbye, goodbye, goodbye.