Disappearing in America: After Peter Gizzi

It’s good to hear a child’s laugh in America

With innocence flooding the cochlea and

Harmonizing with the indie riffs of rock.

It’s good to be in a coffee shop waiting for a café enema.

Triple shot, soy, no whip—

Red Bull in hand

Impatiently waiting for the disconnected walk across a world

Of people in headphones and cellphones.

Please don’t text and walk.

I never once thought I’d be strapped to technology

yet here I am typing this on my phone.

I am the enemy of my enemy’s friend.

It’s good to be lost in the concrete jungle, with a notion that we are all gods.

And the gods who believe in God are disengaged gods, subject to orthodoxy.

Eye to eye with the culprit. Just rid the fucking pulpit.

Isn’t it great here with the dandelions sprouting from the cracks on the sidewalk?

Roundup the killers and spray it with Monsanto.

Eat your vegetables.

It’s good to comply in America.

Where the rich and guilty are treated better than the poor and innocent.

Home of the brave and land of the free to indiscriminant revenue generation.

License and registration please.

Yes, I do have an emergency.

I’m trudging with my hands in the air.

It’s good to feel spied on in America.

Metadata protected by a phrase like “national security” looming across the media stations.

Grope me before I board the plane and don’t let the terrorists win.

You’re either for us or against us—we are passing the Patriot Act.

Fifty-four percent of the budget goes to military that kill for peace.

It’s good to worship at the Bohemian Grove.

What does it mean to sit and wait for a revolution?

What does it mean to fight from a keyboard?

It’s good to be a cartoon in America.

Drawn to perfection and living without fear.

Bugs and Daffy never worried about nuclear fallout.

It’s good to be white in America.

Where a man can make a million mistakes and still get a second chance.

Where a man cannot overly stress when losing a job.

Where a man can strive for the American dream,

Which is now paying bills on time.

I never believed in white privilege until now.

One man had a dream, I had that dream.

The entire Constitution has been compromised.

This is why the world can’t have nice things.