July 4: Great Aplomb, Independence Day, Patricia Lockwood, "Is Your Country a He or a She in Your Mouth"

The evening had passed festively enough.  The tree had been decorated with great aplomb and by ten-thirty everyone had left and the children were in bed...

Ives has just thrown his annual Christmas tree decorating party.  Everyone has left, and Ives is now in the afterglow of all the family and friends and fellowship.  Not to mention the food and alcohol.  It's an annual tradition, and Ives revels in it.

I'm not going to belabor this post with any kind of philosophizing.  It is Independence Day in the United States, and I have a community picnic and fireworks display to get to.  Earlier today, I went to two parades.  Bagpipes and firetrucks and class reunion floats.  It's an annual tradition for me and my family, like Ives' annual Christmas party.

Last night, my sister was flown down to the University of Michigan.  I have nothing really new to report.  The doctors are performing all kinds of tests before determining the best course of treatment for her.  I am hopeful.  That's the best I can say on this July 4, where freedom is celebrated.  For the first time in about a week, I feel hope.

Saint Marty wishes all his disciples a blessed Independence Day, wherever you may live in this world.

Is Your Country a He or a She in Your Mouth

by:  Patricia Lockwood

Mind is a man I think.  I love men, they call me
a fatherlandsexual, all the motherlandsexuals
have been sailed away, and there were never
any here in the first place, they tell us.  Myself
I have never seen a mountain, myself I have
never seen a valley, especially not my own,
I am afraid of the people who live there,
who eat hawk and wild rice from my pelvic
bone.  Oh no, I am fourteen. I have walked
into my motherland's bedroom, her body
indistinguishable from the fatherland
who is "loving her" from behind, so close
their borders match up, except for a notable
Area belonging to the fatherland.  I am drawn
to the motherland's lurid sunsets, I am reaching
my fingers to warm them, the people in my
valley are scooping hawk like crazy, I can no
longer tell which country is which, salt air off
both their coasts, so gross, where is a good nice gulp
of Midwestern pre-tornado?  The tornado above me
has sucked up a Cow, the motherland declares,
the tornado above him has sucked up a Bull,
she says pointing to the fatherland.  But the cow
is clearly a single cow, chewing a single cud
of country, chewing their countries into one,
and "I hate these country!" I scream, and
their eyes shine with rain and fog, because
at last I am using the accent of the homeland,
at last I am a homelandsexual and I will never
go away from them, there will one day be two
of you too they say, but I am boarding myself
already, I recede from their coasts like a Superferry
packed stem to stern with citizens, all waving hellos
and goodbyes, and at night all my people go below
and gorge themselves with hunks of hawk,
          the traditional dish of the new floating heartland.

Okay, not everyone celebrates Independence Day