Another Poem of the Day

The Leopard’s Spots

How hard not to be an American anymore

(which I am still by my passport and my lack of other citizenship)

Because when anyone asks me what such and such means I no longer know

And when they ask me why I am doing such terrible things

I have to admit the president does not consult with me or ask my opinion;

And when people write their letters and essays,

When they speak collectively for or against this or that,

I don’t know what they mean, who they refer to,

And it is implied strongly that I should, I can’t.

If I open my mouth they stare in disbelief at the strange accent,

If I write a few words they glare at the spelling, the syntax,

The allusions they never came across and blame me for being a snob.

I grew up there a long time ago

And for my entire youth I went to school, learned my manners

And framed reality around the streets and trees and hills,

The flow of the seasons and the nature of the wind;

And I long for them intentsly, I dream my dreams over there,

Yet it's now all a foreign place and my family and friends are strangers.

Here, alas, if I walk out of the house and down the drive,

It doesn’t seem real, the buildings are cardboard, the people mere dolls,

The mountains have the wrong shape, the rivers lack all familiar life,

The friendly greetings are absurd, the gestures without meaning,

And my jokes misunderstood. 

This is the bottom of the world where everything is topsy-turvy,

the drains flow backwards, the months have no substance,

and cars drive on the wrong side of the road,

and I have to be like them, pretend I follow the rules,

smile like an idiot, show concern for sports and tools.

If they say G’day, I nod back as though in agreement,

When I am ill I joke with the doctor, the nurse, the ambulance staff.

When they say, You’re history, mate, I listen with deep concern.

So does it end, so does life run out, no more pretence,

And as I am fading away, one eye open, one ear stuffed,

I hear the neighbours whisper one to another, “Know who he was?”

“Never said a word, poor old guy.”  “What a way to go.”