P. in Poughkeepsie

HUNG     In the southwest corner of Dutchess County
On a soot-covered bed of mica schist and Allegheny bluestone
You are renowned as Poughkeepsie
Surrounded by Vassar, Marist, and human flotsam
Rainbow babes and babies
Junkies and small-time pushers
Old Poles and Sicilian pastry chefs
Litigators, family courts and police stations
The Italian Fair and Rails-to-Trails,
The pedestrian bridge and Amtrak and Metro North
Yogis will run through you like
Old spirits in search of bodies,
Not hurried, not without cheer
True solitude is not here
But cold wind, rock and steel
Gentry and the unworking class
Old community pillars and
Yuppies getting MFA's
Students with Manhattan timeshares
Retirees on welfare
Drunks on malt liquor forties
Pervs on porn
Loud Puerto Rican girls on Dunkin Donuts coffee
Fat old ladies on Weight Watcher's
Artists on turpentine fumes
Priuses with priapic piety
Rock stars on tour dates,
Coliseums on graduation days,
Whistles on trains.
Dear Poughkeepsie, you smell familiar
Let us swap credentials
I'll option my future
Against your gentrification
I'll hedge my bets
With your barely trimmed hedgerows,
Their tangled CVS bags flapping in the breeze
You are not a rat but there are rats in you
Like any seafaring city
Your fortunes ebbed and flow
With century tides and IBM restructurings.
Now your backyards are crowded
With countless crows at sunset,
Let us be loud, then quiet with them,
Messengers of American soul.