A whisper in a dotted cloud

A whisper in a dotted cloud
that is over your head
as your hat flies off
and starts to sail the
way of all your wishes
to be at the sea near the waves
that is damp with salt water air,


Cold air on the river front facing Toronto
in our California skins
though Michigan is the
state of our birth, our claim
that rings for all the time
our friends remember our names
when it comes to saying that we just got in
off the road on a long trek through the valleys and mountains
of a country
defined each mile by the brand names on
bulletin boards, cars and bran flakes,
Detroit remains
tall buildings and
the widest streets anyone could die on ,


It seemed that all clouds formed over the river
and came from the north
and stayed with us State side,
where the heart of the neighborhoods
were filled with coughs
and stutter from basements
where jazz blared into the cushions of white supremacy,


I throw flower petals
into the river,
and the garlands drift on the wakes of
freighters a hundred years fueled by
colder examples of life
burned into the tanks of
our station wagon couldn't trace
with all our maps and
anthology of hazy directions from
farmers in one-silo towns
who think anyone passing through is hungry,
in need of a old truck to buy,


I think so much for dotted clouds,
so much thinking, there will be casinos
in a writing that makes sense of its words,
make them march, yes , march,
and I shall smoke in my dreams
after the dreaming is done of coming home
and there is only
the dreaming of dreaming itself,

there is no sleep in these early pages of the novel
that is nothing but a skyline
amid the details of a river and
a glass city that faces a wind that
whistles up the nylons
and down the high collar necks ,
wondering about
who might have been here first dreaming
of these terrible orders of cars and train tracks
full of wagons of TV dinners, palettes of magazines, toys,
counterfeit money coming back
to California because
California is always hungry and
land gives itself over to
families that remember less
than insanity allows and takes away,
all the habits that stop feeling good,


all the silence only a knock on the door
and the landlord's eye
give you as you wipe your feet again


in panic at the little things when it seems
that you're in between two worlds, fingering
the membrane
that allows you to hover over
great industrial mistakes,


you are the dotted cloud
whispering instructions
on the breeze of a stale vibe,


you are the god of this world that saddens you,
every last gust of air on the last floor of the first
building you rode an elevator in
is a trace of tears cried in blackouts that is the rain
that washes away the sins and stains
of this earth,


dotted clouds
on the rail staring at Windsor
on a street where there's a giant iron fist
aimed right at the heart of the water front,
sing with praise,
sing,
oh yes, sing…