Who is it up to if it isn't up to you? In motels I discover how ugly I am, the mirrors at home too habitual to be noted. I chose methodically to be anti-beautiful, Christian fat keeps you safe from adultery! With delight I drown my lungs in smoke and drink that extra bottle of wine that brings me so much closer to the gods. Up the road a dozen wetbacks were caught because one stopped at a ranch house, desperate for a cigarette. Olive oil and pork sausage are pratfalls, an open secret to the stove. In the newspaper I read that thirty-two dairy cows ate themselves to death on grain by shaking loose an automatic feeder ("They just don't know any better," the vet said). Of course false modesty is a family habit. The zone-tailed hawk looks like and mimics the harmless turkey vultures with which it often flies for concealment, stoops in flight and devours the creatures who thought, "It's just a vulture." | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE BLOSSOM, FR. SONGS OF INNOCENCE by WILLIAM BLAKE SUMMER WIND by WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT DREAM SONG: 1 by PAUL LAURENCE DUNBAR HERO AND LEANDER by CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE TO SENECA LAKE by JAMES GATES PERCIVAL TO MY ANTENOR, MARCH 16, 1661/2 by KATHERINE PHILIPS THE ROSES ON THE TERRACE by ALFRED TENNYSON |