Sleepless States Of America Poem by Robert Rorabeck

I am good
When the liquor is 70% proof
And Wild Bill fires his guns into the belly of
Insouciant stars,
And that is enough,
Because this poem is as good as paper burning,
Or the way cut flowers look good for a week on her
Table nearly three years ago because she began
Listening to his music, and making love to him,
And thinking about me in the early morning dreams of
Black bears who eat their breakfast smeared off her breasts:
And, because I am only halfway there,
This is not Walt Whitman,
And this ain’t even great American poetry,
But the rote memorization of a cheeseburger, or a sand dollar
Bikini she should be wearing in my imagination,
Because if you look at me straight in the eyes,
You who work the deepest nights in the brightest
Holes for minimum wage,
You who sell us the wealth of Iran,
You must see that I am not only old enough,
But wise enough, though passing homely through your store
With my dirty baseball cap on denoting I am only a worker,
And wishing for just what I can afford,
The liquors like the breast milk you fed your children
I now buy from you, and later on down the road
A home and a bed for my dogs and to make love in
To strange young women who can never see me
Who also work in brightly lit stores
In strip malls like long knotted coffins all up and down
These great and sleepless states of America.