The Lifelong Liquidation Sale (1850-1950) (1 & 2)
California, there's no turning back
from the cabinet marked, "Dead Deals."
"The rain falls on the United States as the rain wonders,
"What is the United States?'"
1.
"But I'm okay, you're okay,
I'm okay, you're okay.
Just remember death is coming,
sooner course and later course."
California by airplane window:
tract houseing, like rows of teeth,
the nervouse grin of the idled frontier;
the chain frontier: like the suburbs stuttered,
or like a two-lane highway for flocks of crows.
On the first floor of the Wells Fargo
where I answer phones:
a covered wagon, behind glass,
before Japanese men, with the same gray suits,
with kids and cameras that flash and reflect.
Walking by, it looks as if
light were an antique dealer.
Far too much world for a single stanza:
a bank museum,
a digital sign over Montgomery and Sutter writing itself in mid-air
the Indian names that stuck but the world was buffed around.
2.
"So I went to the dealership and things got weird,
The place was empty... Balloons and streamers everywhere..."
Every store keeps a "Closeout Sale"
homeward sail in the safe in the back
they pray they'll never have to fly.
That faint light on, through windows,
after hours, is the nervous energy
of every aisle pacing itself.
"C.E.B. is saying goodbye to Berkeley after 51 years."
51 years of waking up to the shrink-wrap of dew.
The No credit? No problem! wishing well.
The Lifelong Liquidation Sale.