THE DEATHLESS WEST

At the beginning of the Century
During Bush II
I applied for Citizenship
So as to become
An American.

Rap Sheet: Born English
But wanting to be an American.
Initially infected 
In 1957 on hearing
Jail House Rock. 

I was not required to Renounce
The Country of my birth.
Sometime previously
Congress had changed the Law
So Rupert Murdoch could 

Remain a Dinkum Aussie.
I thus became
A True-Blue American
While remaining a Brit -
Easing my natal Dysphoria.

America is not a Land 
Of Either/Or. 
More like Both/And.
Of Conspicuous Choices
Of all the same. 

Oreos and Hydrox
Best Foods and Hellmann’s
Both Biden and Trump.
Any color
As long as it’s Black.

Or, what Delmore Schwartz
Wrote about a boy
Named Jeremiah Dickson
Who was 
A True-Blue American:

Refusing to accept alternatives, refusing to believe the choice of between;
Rejecting selection; denying dilemma; electing absolute affirmation: knowing
in his breast
The infinite and the gold
Of the endless frontier, the deathless West.

A Land of No Decisions
And of No Consequences.
A Life without Discernment 
Of Vapidity Everlasting.
Where only Death is Denied.