The Chanteuse

I was born down the road
where there ain't no

roads, no pictures
no producers neither—

I danced to the radio

when it wasn't singing Sunday,
auditioned for the locusts

& mocking-
birds, the chickens

who never hollered Cut.

Soon I knew I had to see
the ocean fill with sun

& grabbed me a morning train
to pull my way here

where stars paparazzi the ground.

Here, the five stories
to my flat keep me fit—

that, and a hot plate, a cold
can of beans whose jagged lid

opens your hand
as if it was charity. Giving

blood. Here
the couch has a caste

all its own—the can-can
line each night grows broader

the kicks higher

but still sounds better
than the soup line.

Soon the world might want
to hear a country girl sing

bout her last good thing—

Said soon the world might
want itself to hear

this country girl sing bout
her last good thing—

Earn my hand a green-gold ring.

Till then the nights fill
with what I know

must be stars beyond
flickering streetlights, the haze—

I've learned that even after
it sets, the smallest sun can stay,

your eyelids stain—

if you stare straight
at it, a camera, don't look away.