some things i saw in washington

i went to washington DC a few months ago,

to celebrate the new president and witness a little history.

that was very cool. actually it was pretty damn cold.

but anyway that was my second visit in a year,

the first time was just a normal visit.

you know, to look at the memorials and museums

the marble columned institutions.

it was late autumn, the edge of winter, just beautiful 

especially the red-leaved trees beside that sunken wall

inscribed with all those names.

the senseless fallen ones, as usual.

i saw myself reflected, faintly,

like a mirror behind the names

in the sheen of all that polished black granite

and on the steps below abe lincoln's calm gaze

some school children were clustered around their teacher.

he spoke to them about slavery and the civil war.

meanwhile, the ipod-wearing-spandexed joggers

were puffing steam on the gravel paths

between the monuments and the cherry trees,

the bronze statues and the ponds.

and there were twelve thousand little american flags

stuck in the grass in front of a shrouded empty podium.

the national christmas tree was strung with lights

and standing on a lawn way behind behind the white house,

sort of disconnected you know, and by the way,

the white house is much smaller than I expected.

it's kind of stuck right in the midst

of a very urban downtown setting,

it seems homier than the iconic seat of power.

maybe that's just me.

there's a lot of sidewalk hot dog and pretzel carts everywhere,

and commemorative t-shirts, three for ten dollars

we saw a bomb sniffing dog poking in the pansies

behind the iron fence in front of the white house

and a woman living in a tent right across the street, 

apparently she's been keeping a peace vigil there for decades,

I wonder if she's still there. probably forever.

and of course, i just had to see the watergate hotel,

it's this huge rambling pile and out front in a traffic circle

there's a statue of benito juarez  pointing his finger at the sky

where the helicopters drone around every few minutes.

we went to the smithsonian where

a lot of important historic stuff is gathered:

it's amazing, alexander graham bell's telephone

and thomas edison's lightbulb.

right next to the very first  swanson's tv dinner tray,

albert einstein's pipe and colonel custer's coat,

a pike from john brown's raid,

the first nugget from sutter's mill,

thomas jefferson's bible,

ben franklin's walking stick,

but also…..

marilyn monroe's white kidskin gloves,

mr rogers' sweater and archie bunkers chair.

they've got the greensboro lunch counter

complete with stools,

the 60 minutes stopwatch, the top hat lincoln wore

to ford's theater, john phillip sousa's baton,

beaded buckskin dresses from the kiowa.

all these things. this stuff with all it’s stories

and i tried to remember them as i stood

and saw my self reflected faintly

behind those fifty thousand names

chiseled through the sheen of that black granite wall.

i wanted some memories of my own

i wanted to stand and cheer a little history as it’s made.

with a couple million friends freezing our butts off

on the national mall.

so we went back to washington this january

and joined the river of people streaming through the streets

and arrived at our designated entry gate,

and everything just stopped.

we were crammed in so tight and no one’s getting in,

apparently the security checkpoint here was closed

so we tried to find another place to enter. and another. fruitless. closed up.

and it was cold. but ahhh, the air and space museum was open.

and they’ve got hot chocolate and coffee in a McDonalds cafe on the mezzanine.

and it has glass walls and a glass roof. with a view of the mall.

and what do you know,

a television mounted up behind the counter.

so there we were,

with a bunch of other refugees from the frigid breeze

listening to our new president speak

and we could hear the voices

of the millions roaring right through those walls.

watching the inauguration on a TV at McDonalds,

we flew 3,000 miles from home to be here,

and we're watching TV at McDonalds

at the Air and Space museum.

but you know, somehow it just fit.