On the shores of 1968 I played in puberty
and finding myself before the world found me.
Poets fled to Canada and trumpet players
bled in Vietnam.                          
                              Streets were electric and a
balcony in Memphis was sighted by the ghost
of grassy knoll.                    
                            Felons and goodfellas did what
they’ve always done, run the reaping machine.  

A book of poetry, written in 1968, by a
writer whose name I can’t hear in the
dream where I see the cover matted by a
pastel sky of orange and blue, limns the 
truth in lines about the war.
                                                   I search for
this book, my errand tasked from outside
time.          
          I haven’t found it yet, but I have found
hope because      
                         the world is searching, too.