This place is all asphalt temple,
a tornado of highway curling like smoke over an altar,
but there is no ancient magic here. This city is
a brand new neon rite
that forgot the words to its own ceremony.
But who cares? It looks so pretty.
This city is a savage glamour of glitter thick as smog
cast like a spell over a broken vertebrae skyline;
Flattery flattens the clouds into screen print pictures-prophecies
that shift easy as cigarette smoke and mirrors.
Everyone swears it’s their name in written into the sky,
then quick as a spell, egos everywhere swell
like the soiled tents under every local bridge
where the homeless are heaped like living sacrifices.
This place is brutal magic of knocked out teeth
thrown like bloody lots into the street. If you breathe,
you can let the smell of urine into your lungs:
one more thing you will take with you
without ever giving back to this city, so inhale deep.
Feel the stench tuck itself in the space between your nose and throat.
And remember, this place has only ever run on fumes;
a frantic train on a celluloid track
that never learned how to stop over-extending itself
into a horizon long and untouchable as a model’s bare legs.
Somewhere out of reach, the heavens
are stretched into a silver screen like a cheap trick,
But you’re tearing after it,
fast as your cheap-champagne laugh will take you,
in hopes of hurling yourself through the moonlit film,
so you can see how the world looks
from the other side of the stars.
Should I ever bother saying
how many tried this trick before you?
Just move back to Missouri.
Dress yourself in the clothes you scavenged from our thrift stores.
You’ll look world-wise and bohemian
at your five-year high school reunion.
And when they ask why the acting didn’t work out,
casually make up a story about partying with Charlie Sheen.
Make sure the quarterback hears it,
even if he’s standing a little ways off.
Maybe he’ll marry you now that he’s grown a beer gut.
Just move back to Missouri.
Dress yourself in the clothes you scavenged from our thrift stores.
You’ll look world-wise and bohemian
at your five-year high school reunion.
And when they ask why the acting didn’t work out,
casually make up a story about partying with Charlie Sheen.
Make sure the quarterback hears it,
even if he’s standing a little ways off.
Maybe he’ll marry you now that he’s grown a beer gut
