The War Monument

And he overflows
with hearty sentences.
He stands in the public places
on purpose, He knows
that it's the same as
the baseball stadium in Boston,
in Chicago, in New York,
and he always wanted to
hit something really hard.

Ignorance runs its long courses
through impressionable people,
who have not yet begun to age,
and they think, stupidly,
that he is a baseball game.

Entertainment for their sleepy minds,
but wait,
this entertainment feels
it feels
and he reads his crowd like
a badly written book
and the veteran's tears run down.
They gather,
they shuffle closer
and he has his audience.

I am wearing brown,
my darkest hair, white skin and red lips
are sad that this wintery sacred place,
this wishing vacant space,
that is bottling name after name,
of lives now in a burglar's bag,
is being used
for a dirty soap box,
and there are people here
who are falling for it.


So, I take my small face
and my brown boots
away,
and I try
to respect everyone.