"What Ely Was."
"It was the mauve, the ocher of canned tamales.
It was the dark silt of gravy burning.
It was the hominy's white knuckles.
It was fat that made every surface gleam like a pigeon's
neck, like a spill of gasoline.
It was melt-down crusts of oleo on the tuna casserole, toast
that was blackened to a piece of macadam, a singed field, a roof
shingle.
It was the cool unguent of jam on a spoon,
but even that sweet thing had a sting.
And it was good for you, that needle, that pin.
Under the beautiful blue glass dome of plum
preserves was a bite of penicillin.
I longed for chocolate both sweet and bitter,
fried green plantain, mustard, onion, red tomato,
rice and black beans in a pot, Moroccan olives
with cayenne, Haut-Brion, cabbage and ham.
And somewhere some green coast exported
all I wanted of all I wanted.
There was a kingdom where my hunger fit, both mind and body,
all of it.
And so for me at Sunday sermons, the serpent coming lightly
and perfectly into the garden was as smart as Eve,
was pink and fat and pliant, was tough as a root,
but blue or green.
The uninterruptedness of him--
from tail to lip, all one thing, consistent as a walking stick.
Or he was a ruby cummerbund, a glove on its way to the opera,
dropped in the dust of this godforsaken place.
Beside his motionless heat, Ely, Nevada,
was as dull as two buttons.
He was the green light.
He was the go-ahead.
He was the spark, the road.
He was the ticket out."