Dear Norm,
My “Fuck Bush” tee shirt is starting
to smell a little suspicious.
I bought it from a
militant “lib’ralist” website,
back in the gush v. bore days,
a sop for my lib’ralist friends
and prod for the others. Those
were heady days of partisan hate,
then the only remaining trusted estate
went and appointed him.
I washed it and it shrunk, Norm, down
to fit tight enough
I could wear it to clubs
and pretend youth. And the world
changed, and I only wore it
under other shirts,
for a while.
(for fear of a Texas style lynchin’)
I used to be a jock. Norm,
I know of their superstitious
lucky socks and whatnot. Well,
this election season that’s how I’ve felt
about my “Fuck Bush” tee shirt.
I have worn it every day
since the press pulled their readers
out from under Dean.
He could have hit the President
in the charisma, where it matters.
I wore it for each of the debates,
like a jersey, hoping to give the candidate
a sympathetic magic shove; hoping
he would swing for the bleachers,
swatting it out of the park
like an ol’ time glamorous sultan
(but maybe he’s so wooden that
my stinky totem magic only bore
him limping ‘round the bags).
Now, there’s little time remaining,
but I can smell the “Fuck Bush” tee shirt,
over my own stinking American body,
over the mildew of the
Czechoslovakian surplus store duffel,
an ape’s nest odor, all the way over here.
But it also blunts
the aroma of the microbe-killing chemicals
in the tap water,
the industrial emissions on the wind.
I hope the odor offends the people in line at the polls,
or we’ll see if the smell,
like the slogan, can be protected
political expression. Come, Norm; to the Supremes!
Sincerely,
Ann Ominous Jock