Ketchikan, Alaska
There are no roads to Ketchikan
of Revillagigedo Island,
the first city in Alaska.
We venture out by skiffs and ferries.
The airport lies across the Narrows.
The dock seams the ocean
to the small town crawling up the hill.
Ketchikan Creek flows through
making houses on stilts look like women
holding up their long skirts in a flood.
We’re still the salmon capital of the world,
but we no longer log the Tongass Forest.
The Tlingit,
Haida and Tsimshian live here.
We have more totem poles than most
and tourists toting cameras.
The Misty Fjords National Monument beckons.
We have a moderate climate
and you won’t find polar bears.
Yep, (silly) we take American currency,
and keep the change.
2 comments:
I wrote two for this one, a serious one and a fun one. Serious one first:
January 8th, 2011
I wasn’t living here when you fell
wasn’t even thinking about it
but I thought about you standing up there
not knowing you were being a hero
just doing your job, speaking, being heard
no one knows why mad men pull the trigger
more questions are asked if they are sane
did you know you inspired a man to jump on his wife to protect her?
do you have survivors guilt that children weren’t so lucky as you?
its normal if you do, no one could blame you
you stood up again yesterday
in a theater twenty minutes from my house
more conscious of, but no more proud in, your heroism.
Now that I’ve moved here I remember you
and take a small ownership of that moment
when Twitter told me a congresswoman from Arizona
had been shot
Lighter one:
Necessary Nomenclature
Some cities have a variety
of options to name their sports teams after
no dearth of recognizables in New York or Chicago
plenty of history in Philly or DC
culture and ambition saturate New Orleans and St Louis
but we grasp onto the thing all men have
though we have more than most
we are the Phoenix Suns
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