Hundred Dollar Bill Poem by Robert Rorabeck

Going to Colorado for a celebration,
But not one of language-
We don’t do that in my family, put on airs
For things which might not exist-
The poet’s self immolation in the waves
Is ignored, because there is nothing
Lucrative about dying for a form which
Cannot be bottled:
So we celebrate the pseudo-sciences,
Break horses in the high dust,
Vote Republican and bury our dead deep enough:
When it comes to taxes, f! ck them,
Because we did what we could and we’re
Not drinking their tea anyways-
We work straight on through noon,
And my sister has done good and well,
And sometimes I see her swimming in the sky
When the forecast is hazy, and the fires are bringing
Out the sweaty lions from their kills:
Hauntingly they gambol into the traffic,
Their tongues rippling a silence which in stanzas
Has not been written down outside the sycophantic
Trills their tracks lie under:
She is getting married in August down the neck
Of my mountain, and it will be such a thrill,
And we will fire our guns high up through the
Unbroken forest, mother and father will kiss,
Like my sister and her husband will kiss,
Like the lion’s sudden kill,
And I will lie against the earth like my woman,
And smirk like a drunken toy again to my other sister,
And night will fall,
And god will have his will.