Real Life

　　 by Lucie Brock-Broido

　　 Soon the electrical wires will grow heavy under the snow.

　　 I am thinking of fire of the possibility of fire & then moving

　　 Across America in a car with a powder blue dashboard，

　　 Moving to country music & the heart

　　 Is torn a little more because the song says the truth.

　　 Because in the thirty-six things that can happen

　　 To people， men & women， women & women，

　　 Men & men， in all these things the soul is bound

　　 To be broken somewhere along the line，

　　 That clove-scented， air-colored wanderer blushing

　　 With no memory， no inkling & then proceeds

　　 Across America

　　 In the sap green of the tropics，

　　 Toward the cadmium of a bitter sunrise to a new age，

　　 At the white impossible ice hour， starving，

　　 Past the electric blue of the rivers melting down，

　　 Above the nude， snuff， terra cotta， maybe fire，

　　 Over the tiny fragile mound of finger bones

　　 Of an Indian who died standing up，

　　 Through the heliotrope of a song about the sunset，

　　 To live the thirty-six things

　　 & never comes home.