Repatriation: A Thanksgiving Poem

I came back to America today
to her fields, her factories, her baseball and bars.
I came back to her slow burning forests
her rivulets of asphalt, her neon ocean
I came back to her chicken waitresses
Pecking at my coffee with a glass-beaked pot
Her sycamore men, in parks, on porches
thousand year old roots still weaving.

I came back to America to see
her washaterias, her apple orchards
her Rubik's cubes and roundabouts
I came back to dip my head in
her fountains, her soil, her underbrush.
I came back to wade in her politics,
in her media, in her Saturday morning cartoons.

I came back to wear meatloaf like a hat
to urinate on fire hydrants
to run invisible flight plans
from my gabled window

I came back to peel the orange
off the slow setting sun
To walk as wind
through mint-flavored pines
To cup beautiful like a bee
in the hive of my hands.

I came back to America
to walk across her deserts
her prairies, her mountains, and mesas
her trusses and bridges
her ciliche, her dirt, her brick
I came back to walk
on her formica, her tinfoil
her notebooks and negligee
her demigods and dinosaur bones.

I came back to America
to swallow presidents
To say their names
like I say my grandfather's
to chew their words like bubblegum
to wax political with the ants

I came back to America for pie,
for cobbler, for wedding cake,
for t-bone dinners,
for t-bone breakfasts,
for heavy white bread
soaked in egg and fried
upon my plate.

I came back for college football,
for potato chips and paralysis,
eyes glued to the tube,
watching for god-moment men.

I came back for sidewalks,
for cotton candy and caramel apples
for stick ball and dead end streets,
for astronauts and acrobats
for the twenty tongued tiger
to purr at my feet
for constellations, for sewing circles
for homemade wine and biscuits
for scratch and sniff sentiments
for dogs, heavy like a blanket.

I came back to America to pause

to take a deep breath
to open up a book
to curl up at her sensible soles
to hear her harrowing history of me.