that looks like a cosmopolitan cosmos.
So much territory, all of it lit up;
how could you not find promise here?
and you’ve made it through the dawn,
there’s no getting around it.
Los Angeles is seedy, plastic,
and impossible.
The abrasive sun
casts a harsh clarity on Los Angeles,
while its murky smog makes escape
feel impossible.
hardly the beacon of virtue,
I find myself here every ten years
as a rickety remind that my
look at Los Angeles is not in the dark or from a distance.
I am here,
reading poetry to famous strangers,
sleeping on a boat,
brunching in West Hollywood, always day.