Eric Lorberer

Notes for the Procession

Over by the yellow flowers
our drunks are sculpting the country's
ceramic head; children
kick them between rounds.
Yesterday
I watched men throw themselves
repeatedly into a river:
tourists broke into applause,
the film crew loved it.
At the autopsy, a crane
snaked into the scene, smashing
the evidence. Over there,
near the olive trees,
you get lost, looking for constellations.
The parade of neighbors wearing faces
distracts you from the change in your pocket,
the graven image you don't recognize
the last bus home.
The country, you know, is an unswept theater.
Over by the yellow flowers someone's
grave is dug up but the twilight thickens.

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Eric Lorberer is the editor of the Rain Taxi Review of Books. His poems have been published or are forthcoming in many magazines, including Denver Quarterly, Exquisite Corpse, Mudfish, Colorado Review, and Volt. This poem is from a recently completed manuscript, entitled United States. contents | previous