Anthem

         To the city next to the city
      of evaporated milk: I pledge my undead river,
   my peach-soaked August. Cowshit underpits
of a spring gone soft. I pledge it: my gray skies
      scabbed green. The cottonwoods’ insistent cavort.
   How they call to birds of no name, and no name,
and no name. I pledge to my birds the milky larvae
      flexing under the hydrangeas, the salted bellies
   of treefrogs. Olive patina of where-a-snail-has-been:
fucking on the sunburned patio. Hold my hand
   and pledge, with me, every goldfish tunneling
      through Rasmussen Lake. Dumping ground
         of pets of true intention. Pledge, with me,
   the tigerskin rotting on the spilled roof. How I wanted
      to kiss his mildew. What was left of his face.
            What I needed from it. Then pledge,
         as I did, my needless want: flossing
      the hanging tire, tonguing boys in my father’s raincoat.
   My back flattened against the picnic table.
               My undead youth browning
         her legs on the malted beachhead.
            Unzipping the soccer fields
         at the seam. Pledge it.
      The place I always return to. The raincloud
            that bleeds and bleeds
               out.