a poem for the inauguration

All My Life I've Been Waiting

All my life I've been waiting

for something unusual to happen.

I may yet come into a windfall,

a National Endowment of the Hearts.

All my life I've been expecting

a grand finale, an awakening,

love erupting in the streets,

in the bars, in classrooms,

everyone dropping their guard,

their pants, their skirts,

cops weeping tenderly

as they snap off your cuffs,

bankers giving away their money,

politicians telling the truth,

literary critics confessing

that they know nothing about writing or life.

All my life I've been waiting

for something unusual to happen.

Harold Norse
BENIDORM, SPAIN, 1956