In Back Of The Real

 railroad yard in San Jose 
 I wandered desolate 
in front of a tank factory 
 and sat on a bench 
near the switchman's shack.
 

A flower lay on the hay on 
 the asphalt highway 
--the dread hay flower 
 I thought--It had a 
brittle black stem and 
 corolla of yellowish dirty 
spikes like Jesus' inchlong 
 crown, and a soiled 
dry center cotton tuft 
 like a used shaving brush 
that's been lying under 
 the garage for a year.
 

Yellow, yellow flower, and 
 flower of industry, 
tough spiky ugly flower, 
 flower nonetheless, 
with the form of the great yellow 
 Rose in your brain! 
This is the flower of the World.
 

 San Jose, 1954

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