Weekly poem: Let’s Just Say

Let’s just say there were only so many radicals
on the lower east side in the 30s,
more than a hundred, fewer than a thousand, and
Let’s just say they got around.

Let’s just say there’s no way of knowing
whose grandmother fucked whose great uncle,
whose children our parents really are.
Let’s just say we’re all descendants of the city.

Let’s just say they all ran together,
visited Mexico City and gladly pissed
on idols at the temple of the sun,
let illegitimate toddlers chase Trotsky’s chickens,
left town for unstated reasons at gunpoint in the middle of the night,
opened delis in Jersey and staffed them with aliens,
waved shaky arms and refused to translate punchlines.
Let’s just say they got around.

(I noodled around about the ending on this one a lot and I’m not 100% sure I like it, but it’s better than the first few drafts. It’s a lot easier to start a poem than it is to finish it.)