Poetry that Seeks to Solve Riddles and Placate the Masses
In the old western I’ve just been watching,
at the end when the man has been shot twice
in the back and he’s in the ditch twitching,
we’re watching the sun go down in the distance
—a coyote and some ravens inching in—
when a hand reaches into the frame
and grabs this man’s shoulder and turns him
briskly over in the ditch, and it’s the face
of all dying liars that we see, weirdly enough;
and on this face is the very same expression
of disbelief we’ve seen countless other times
throughout history, when various men have
been briskly flipped right-side-up in their ditches.
What does this mean? I don’t know.
Nor do I know what it meant when Dick Cheney
showed up at the Obama inauguration
disguised as Dr. Strangelove, do you?
I am not an especially inquisitive person.
I’m not even saying this is a poem.
