I daresay you’ve heard the truth:
those who want their way
get their way
and those who get their way
have their faces on magazines in convenience stores.

But while 7-11 may close at eight,
life doesn’t.
(Life don’t give you Slurpees, either)
Mary-Sue from block 16 wants to be famous
but she can’t get you to notice her,
let alone the country
and the patrons of the Quick-Mart.

A brief encounter with faith won’t get you to the red carpet
and the clerk at the checkout counter won’t get you a six-pack
because even though you’re old enough to blow up Afghanistan
you can’t get wasted until you’re fucking 21.
god, the system is screwed
new cars, new noses, new houses
how about a new attitude?

The high-school girls giggle through the lecture
that the new law recites word-for-word -
Worship your god and worship your Jesus.
I’ll be in the corner
with a coffee and the Chronicle
contemplating the crisis in the country of the critics.
so I see you’re a caricature.
Your head is big enough
but the artist seems to have stopped halfway through
to go to the courtroom and sketch the latest
in screwball celebrities, druggies, bourgeoisie

Wouldn’t he be proud.
Never mind the struggles from sixty-odd ago
They just don’t teach this shit no more - remember the
Emancipation Proclamation?
Taxation without Representation?
Now there’s just a
misinterpretation of the purpose of the nation
whose people have lost all of their determination

And on fifth street where the homeless dwell
and the cafés close at four
The romantics find there’s more to life
than what’s behind the door.
The cynics dream in secrecy
of a once-and-future dawn.
Politicians talk of issues
of which all hope is gone.

In a city of the first and last days
of every person’s life
it’s all that you can do to succumb to the promises.
for if silence is golden then sedition is diamond
you’ve gone wack and you won’t
come
back
The bridges burn
The countries burn
The principles burn
now it’s your turn
11/13/2007

Note: This poem was written with indentation. WordPress can’t render these for some reason, so you can read the poem the way it is supposed to be at DeviantArt.
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