The Falls at Kent

Come sit beside me
under the bridge
the shade is cool this very angry summer
in the middle of the day
in the middle of the week
while police cars hunt us overhead.
Under the bridge is
just out of the naked sun
the sun that bakes long amnesia afternoons.
In shadows see
thick steel girders
forever here because they are made here,
made here in the mills
that will be forever here
because who would move steel around the globe?

Come beside me, hide
just a few more hours
under the bridge by the semicircular falls.
White foam and water
churn with gritty air
smells like the industry and farm runoff upstream
as the river spills
over the concrete barrier
where once a grain mill made this portage a town
and then came canals
and then the railroad
and then the state university pityless buildings
and despite all rhetoric
the secret of America
is that everything was built with public subsidy.

Come sit beside me
skipping our classes
watching violet dining needles silently hover.
This cave of rest
under West Main Street
will shelter us from war’s bloody demands
will give us peace
and let us look up
at gray clouds through thickets of leaves
while the factories
hum forever reproducing
their endless line of shiny machined pieces
and tear-gassed halls
of the university
forever reproduce its shiny status quo pieces.