--- G C   W A L D R E P

Cedar shakes and a mattress (pink again) on grey sand.
Furniture in the dooryard. Since then laws have been passed,
it is no longer legal to install a couch on a porch,
it is no longer legal to stage a musical about the life of an obscure poet.
Still the shutter clicks. Still the engines cycle
like turbines, prefatory to liftoff. 
To be American is to argue the intentionality of weather,
to insist on the inviolability of the text even when the text is absent.
In all the small towns festivals are being held to celebrate the adoption of the diphthong
in economic planning. New water towers are being built,
old water towers are being torn down. No one is questioning the premise
behind the phrase "action figure." I practice my furtive soft-shoe.
The romances of George MacDonald are being reprinted
sans Scottish brogue.