The Blank Of America Poem by Terese Svoboda

Who loots the dew or enjoins
a shadow to guard a tree?

The bird in the pie can't pretend
to arms, its claws rock

the coin in the crust.
The train's single eye

examines the tree that the pie
holds the fruit of,

its engine rasps past the bird
as if smoke lent its shadow.

And the dew? Surely
it's a dark gulp under a tall hat

the bird wings over.
Not noise, not the founding father's

nose. Repeat after me:
I solemnly swear:

I could swear otherwise,
my lips flying too.