Pie-eyed with delight, she orders
the most decadent cut on the universal menu:
a thick slice of liberty, velvet red,
garnished with a plastic bouquet
of Stars and Stripes.
Wafts of early promise and easy credit.
Chocolate-dollar mansions.
Plush-padded hips christened as progress.
The celebration sparkles tonight
like the wake of her first steps—
or the backwash of an aircraft carrier,
the flagship listing heavily in the brine.
Fat and sinking, the girl cannot float.
She can hardly drag her bronze ankles
across the tile after the coma sets in,
drowned in the tallow
of her own sweet myth.
Not to worry.
In another decade
the main course will be Enlightenment 101
at university rates,
provided she hasn’t choked to death
on the candied gospel
she taught the rest of the flock to swallow.
That is the house specialty.
The parlor trick.
She is the patron gorge-feeding at the booth.
She is the prize cattle.
She is the girl working the drive-thru window,
smiling through the rot.
The birthday candles glow
against the frosted glaze.
Back in the grease-trap
the fryers keep themselves hot.
The deep fury department
pulls spun-sugar strings
taut enough to make every shackle dance.
Nobody has to tell us anymore.
We already know our order.