Читать книгу The Milk Hours - John James - Страница 11

Poem for the Nation, 2016

When it’s a weapon, when it flies,

the flag is a striped

idea flapping on a pole. It makes a fine cape,

my daughter says. She wears it on the Fourth.

I say the pledge but never know

if I mean it or I don’t. The alders bleed,

the shot trees on the Capitol lawn

bend in the wind.

Heat collects

in the quarried stone

of white buildings. “This is what

an ailing empire looks like,” you say.

I agree, watching mallards

spin on the Potomac. They paddle

on the surface

of the reflecting pool, webbed feet

beating in assembly,