New Poem

from The Wilco Fragments

all my lies are always wishes
from ashes of American flags

when I use words they float without gravity near my face or fall like dead seeds to the floor the way weeds flourish without rain but flowers die and how leaves can blow clear of the lawn but cigarette butts and candy wrappers huddle in the gutter waiting for me to happen by and the smashed beer cans stay but the buds of roses and blossoms of lilacs fall after just minutes and where do they go? somewhere I can’t see them, across the street with the college students who eat pizza on the stoop and smoke cigarettes letting their dogs shit in our yard and pretty soon the whole planet is covered with dandelions and detritus but where are the individual letters the way an F can unfurl like a flag but somehow the lies balloon inflated with sunshine and open space or how a W flies like a flock or C hangs in the sky like a moon I apologize for what hasn’t actually happened but the pollen is out and my eyes are filled with possibility the way something might happen if only