industry


this place where everything
is dead

where the streets follow themselves
down cinderblock alleys
and i am always in danger of
forgetting your name

this is what grew when the
myth of christ was planted here

not failure bur desolation

a sky without color
and a land without poets
and nothing to write about anyway

and who among us will
speak willingly of the
last great war?

who will justify the need to lock the
pregnant women in cages?

i dream of mt. shasta in the
summer of '66

i dream of the beach at zuma

and who is to blame for these children
born hopeless and deformed
in my waking hours?

what is the need for cities built
from ash and dust?

it becomes a different form
of starvation
this asking unanswered questions

Copyright © 2003 John Sweet