The Patriotic Song

It was just the music of the busy street,
People hurrying, heels falling, briefcases,
Top hats, inverted umbrellas.
Traffic humming at a light.
You couldn’t hear the wind for the wind.
There was no choir of birds.
The homeless man wearing oven mitts
Had an old boom box with an equalizer
Playing the president’s state of the union
Address. He was hanging
On every word.
If only it were a musical, if only
The townspeople would stop their hustling
About and sing and dance together.
And the main character,
The one the whole story’s about,
Would stop trying to dupe them with band instruments
And briefly come to his senses.