By Misti Velvet Rainwater
Date: 20 December 1999

Journey to the Real

tomorrow I'm going to cash my paycheck
pawn everything I own
sell my truck
and buy a Greyhound bus ticket to L.A.
so that I can be
home at last
with the freaks & dreamers
on Venice Beach
my gypsy blood tells me
there is poetry there
waiting to be found
like seashells
and my lovers wouldn't be
uptight and conventional
and they wouldn't give
a rat's ass
about the Cowboys or Aggies
and they wouldn't confine love
to linear dialogue and expectations
until it doesn't even feel
like love
anymore
they would let love
breathe
and jump
and run
and cartwheel its way
into eternity
on dream drenched Saturday nights
and I would have more than 
one boyfriend
(no one can eat just one)
and I wouldn't have sex
with any of them
no, I would save myself
for studio royalty
I would fuck
the head of production
at the most distinctly Jewish studio
and find myself
on the cover of People magazine
smiling my revenge
at all my exes
and dimwitted detractors
shining with hard-won radiance
and then once
I was famous
I'd cash in my 15 minutes
and go to Seattle
and buy a guitar
and learn some chords
and whine about my success
in a coffee bar every night
at ten
until Andy Kaufman reincarnated
would come up to me
and say
Let Me Take You Away From
All of This
and we would leave
straight away
for his chalet
on the moon...