I’m not in a Vancouver restaurant 
out of the rain, nor in Ottawa 
where tulips stand along the Rideau. 
I’m not in Maniwaki Quebec 
at Hubert’s general store 
with winter parkas on sale 
down the aisle from bass lures 
and iron plates. I haven’t gone 
to Tijuana, across the other line, 
where scraggly kids and women 
wait with shell bracelets 
for a gringo to offer a dollar. 
Tonight, rash men will play 
a chancy game of Red Rover 
Come Over against a team wearing 
advantage goggles and guns. 
I wonder about the land 
of immigrants I live in 
where questions linger. 
Were NY hospitals for whites 
slow to take in Billie Holiday 
in her last desperate hours? 
Did borders exist, defended heavily, 
that even Lady Day couldn’t get over? 
I sit in an empty park, the sun falling 
behind old eucalyptus trees, the moon 
waiting in the east to dominate 
the sky. I look around and see 
I’m right in the middle of things.

—From Camera Obscura (Wordcraft of Oregon, 2007)

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