the greatest American writer

8/30/99 The Greatest American Writer

It has to be
Henry Charles
The great
Chin
Ass
Key

I saw you last night
nestled between
Bronte and Burroughs,
keeping time with the icons.
pretending not to care

Boo
Cow
Ski

This ode to you, lonely old courage teacher, is like
Surfing an oil slick
A purse snatcher on quaaludes
A drunk on the dole
A jubilant angel bouncing on a trampoline,
her luminous aura of golden curls
backlit by the setting sun

How much of you is legend
Myth
Lore
How much is playing the part?
The pockmarked, snarling iconoclast reinventing the rules,
The exiled bastard child of Celine and Dostoeski
The haggardly, loathing vagabond gripped
by the catharsis of movement.
It’s all such contrivance
but it’s all true.

Buke
wild, coarse, profane,
your soul shows in your eyes
and you fool only
those
who need you to be
their monochrome ideologue
swatting
at the smug and sanctimonious.
Critics say you’re crude
insolent
a phony
But no more or less
than us all:
the greatest
american
writer