mmcmxv

Rewritten Arkansas

     You only have the right to piss in the fountain
     If you are beautiful.
                                               —Jack Spicer

Yesterday I did not
encounter any fount-
ains. That is not true.

My youth is enshrined
within the hope for
a future; I scan the

hustle and bustle
around me at any
particular moment

until I spot the one
hustler and bustler
who brings a little

tingle up my spine.
The hustlers at
Union Square, no

different than the
bustlers at the
Metreon Target

or, I walk all
the way to
Pier 39

(always
loving to
play the

tourist;
like the
hustler

I believe
I am not,
nor never

could be,
even I know
where to find

the best catch!)
until I spot
The One.

My work has
just begun.
I am enshrined

within the twill
(or the tulle)
of the until.

’Twill happen
one day,
this until.

Like Ponce
de Leon
searching

for, and be-
lieving he
had found,

he had “dis-
covered” (as
we “learned”

in junior
high school;
the class:

Arkansas
History)
the glorious

Fountain of
Youth, his
life-long dream,

in Hot Springs,
Arkansas.
De Leon,

the discoverer
of Arkansas,
The Natural

State, that
great home-
base of my

imagination,
the wondrous
Land of Oppor-

tunity. And
also, as a side-
note, the home of

the “Chocktaw,
Chickasaw,
Cherokee,

Creek...and
sometimes
Sioux.”