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Washington, D.C., Postcard 1988, for my NEA co-workers November inaugurates December, passing on Washington Monument’s baton. October’s umber disappears, its leaves like money spent on war. The crickets, out of office now, repent. Lincoln ponders the Potomac, penniless himself, another frozen park-bench tenant. Winter re-elects a congress of compatriots to fill the tourists’ vacancies. They line the Mall, campaign funds spent, poverty’s incumbents. Tonight’s bus fills with fellow bureaucrats, intent on some disaster just averted—not global, but secretarial. Their clocks repeal the hours until each weekend. They used to want to change the world. . . . Snow begins another filibuster. (The president has vetoed spring this year.) My stint here is nearly over, like an ambassador recalled before she’s learned most local acronyms or slang, but not too soon to call the country home. O, my Emerald City made for black-and-white TV, which a thousand field trips thrill to see, I have fallen in love with my enemy. (May someone grant me clemency!) 48 You are reading copyrighted material published by Ohio University Press/Swallow Press. Unauthorized posting, copying, or distributing of this work except as permitted under U.S. copyright law is illegal and injures the author and publisher. ...

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