The American Poems & The First Boss

( by Nick Mancuso )

1.
not everybody wants it.
the american way, not even the manner, the flag
some people even prefer, but
choose.

your choice is to live
the appendix of living thought
applied

as I
take my bike along the zuma beach
and watch the surfers fall.

2.
when it rains, in america
on grasswood haven when it rains
next to the shopping malls
the real estate agents have a field day...
they talk among themselves
like well dressed moneys
how it’s possible that my money remains the same
while the field next door doubles its price are
there onions in this earth
I know nothing about?

3.
on point dume
in los angeles north
no one is quite sure if its accent ague
or what
dumetz some priest
on vancouvers searching boat
the peaceful tribe of surfing indians
corralled against
this peaceful peninsula and slaughtered
by the salt & pork spanish
bastards...

when it rains on the point
the indian ghosts rise.

4.
on becoming this american citizen.
I realize
now my wandering
is over and I like U

Lyses my ancestor
I have come home
to calypso haven
in this rich harbour.

my first boss was it rain or was it fire?
before the wood and the microship or even the
big twig or the stone
before there was language or was there language always?

later, when we spoke
in the soft harped tongues of mexico,

scottish blackmoor and english
the black moist harbours of the mayan mouths

exploring the regions to the west of the pleiades
we arrived here at night, inside the yellow

kingdom following our fleecy doe-eyed ancestors
emperors all we
searching for the golden apples of the west.
& found hollywood california.
this is my passport lisa
passport to the etruscan mounds
with crowns of diamonds on our rosy heads
and hair as black as stunning coal.
this is my passport, lisa

puccini knew all this too
we knew all this too
but we were oh so lost and
oh so scared to find the land
we thought we lost forever
we thought forever
like latter day children
could we not see our belly buttons in
the bosom of the swallowing darkness glow
arose our plights, without sails,
we?
with stout canvas, towards the north
sailing

towards
the desert lands.
towards
america