A checkered dance floor stained
with the sweat and tears of
Paul McCartney's raging crowd and
Brian Wilson's inky pen casting shadowed
blotches on the ground
almost like
scuff-marks on an era's pride
our era, not his.
Hulking metal deathpots rage across
the Las Vegas strip
knowing full well that amidst a
vaudville show of the homeless
they will not be scouted
by the LVPD
and therefore they find in the poor a richness more than gold.
She stands in the middle of
the blackened cement road
with her arms outstretched
because she thinks dancing the waltz
of a thousand before her is unique, and
holding a knife dripping with poison
is what one must do to be
"real".