above the old truck | and the congregationalist urge
to give account | before witnesses | I write
and talk | at the park | telling my neighbor
how a rebel war flag flies over Interstate 95
and he says | It’s hard—people had family die
in that war | and he doesn’t mean Iraq | or drones
or the border our neighbors’ children die to cross | no
he means the Civil War | But whose uncle
or brother died at Appomattox? | None of us
remember | I had to do the work of books
to find what I did not want to find | history
with its long oppressive arm | its roll calls
and musters | enlistment dates | pension records
Confederate Applications for Pardon | Isn’t
it enough | my fathers and uncles | my brothers
aunts | grandmother and grandfathers
sprang from the South and have done the work
of war? | It is not enough | my mouth is small
a little bole on a live oak | but when my neighbor
says who died | doesn’t he mean who is dying?
And when he nods, says oh yeah, people bitching
about the flag | I recollect the poet who said
to be ashamed is to be American
