Too many words

(to S. A.)

too many words
and not enough Indians.

too many Cowboys
and not enough sons.

too much land
but not enough for mailboxes
three car garages
history packaged in museums
sold at Barnes and Noble and Wal-Mart.

too much Hollywood
and not enough bullets
to merit
the proper
romanticism
of
a squelched debate
that made famous
the argument that Churchill, Truman, and Hitler were opposite sides
of the same outdated coin.

"If you want to know genocide, ask a Jew or an Armenian"
said the instructor
who'd obviously never read one of your poems
in all his years of speaking on behalf of