The American Morning

The American Morning We ride smoothly, deliberately, in this old cruising caravan, Across the ancient American avenues and boulevards, Of the once living, and now, the finally dead, Of the once famous, and now, the finally forgotten; Of tattooed memories applied in the American morning, cooking In the back kitchen, with yellow-yoked eggs frying rapturously, Like monstrous hoards of buzzing locusts, out to kill, In black pans, sizzling and searing sensationally; With mysterious, soulful realizations of disappearing time, The heavenly odors of bacon fat, rising to the old-fashioned clouds, We come here to turn the radio dial, in this summer of winning and losing; But now it is all turning, turning as the shadows of life should turn, For life is the now of when and why; and we all know now, What ‘s waiting and lurking behind the curtained door. “No, kind sir, you go first through the door, sir, if you please.” But as we ride now through these blighted snapshots in time, This creeping caravan from the American morning comes to a halt. Through the windshield and into the American night, old eyes see A crowd of black ballplayers, gathering in Harlem on East River Avenue, Looking to get inside the big ball yard, with the Babe, the Yankee Clipper, And the Iron Horse, hitting fungoes over the EL station, over there, Dressed in over-sized pinstripes, dripping in dirt and tobacco juice, Tipping sweat-stained caps to the roaring, crescendoing ovations, Thundering upward and through the airy reaches of the big ball yard, Somehow do not reach their ears; still, they run fast, as if being chased, Run faster than all the dead baseball gods of the American morning! But now it is all turning, turning as the shadows of life should turn, For life is the now of when and why; and we all know now, What’s waiting and lurking behind the curtained door. “No, kind sir, you go first through the door, sir, if you please.”