I am not for Wisconsin

I should have loved Wisconsin more—

should have been one with the cows, tried to

understand the zen of grass and grazing,

the mantra of milk, the cow-pies sprinkled

in the chicory like approving punctuation.

When the long summer of sheep took me I

should not have pulled away from

the smell of wet wool, or the lambs,

or the grinding of sausage.  But I am not

for Wisconsin, nor could I marry

Michigan—with its maple syrup, 

and tie-dyed autumns, its forests

sliced open by six-lane highways

always delivering you to the souvenir shop

and the carved cedar toilet paper holders

of Tahquamenon Falls. 

A Dakota once grabbed me, but

it was only a passing fancy brought on

by an appreciation of dinosaurs in the distance

and the golden hair of the Corn Princess

in her Corn Palace.

I had a brief fling with Virginia, too,

but all we did was argue—

she had a way of turning every single sunset

into a political rant.  Now I see her only

briefly, passing through smoky parties

on the way to someone else’s mountains.

You may think I am for Ohio—after all,

we have lived comfortably in these

separate rooms for twenty years or more,

but I tell you it is never settled—

tomorrow I may go to Arizona.  Just

pack my things, plant the Amish buggies

in the Queen Anne’s Lace,

and like a stripped out steel mill, empty 

all my aspirations

into the Cuyahoga.

This poem was originally published in Georgetown Review, Spring 2007.