Snapshots of Missoula: Kinko's 1990

There were rumors of you, listings,

adverts that I may have

confused with prophecy.

The pamphlets and the zines,
or that one                                                                                                                                                  banned band poster,
stylishly obscene

the controversial ghost, her

daughters (if not his sons)
found wanton, violent,
Male.

And what were you?  Me?
The third, or fourth, fifth or
sixth sex.  In between,
our intuitive powers
and the hostage hours
that blurred both our desires
and our ambitions,
getting older.  The milk left
in the tit
will sour.

So we forgot
who we are?

When Don(n) call me
Victor staked claim,
and renaming himself
stole from me
that idea of self
I had kept hidden
and precious, moth-eaten.
the fabric, the mantle, the shroud
could keep no one warm--
Writer, poet, artist,
queer.  Words make
for lazy companions,
damp, cold, blankets.

But...

we are all authors
of fates too small,
too brutish
to be called
destiny. So what
if he was (self) published
in that careless air.
He was doing readings
like a poet becoming
a medium, an astrologer,
a witch...

Thus under blue awnings

inside the bleeding panes, the blurred

herds out on the sidewalk

might be frozen
for an instant

by the flash
of a xerox machine.