Pittsburgh 1988

Pittsburgh, where your ancient anchormen are proud
of believing that nothing is new
Pittsburgh is working out your erotic life
while your parents are in the next room debating
how much to put in the collection basket
this Sunday while watching transsexuals solemnly
talk on Sally Jessie Raphael

Pittsburgh is a computerized scalpel wreathed
in the smoke of a million cigarettes

Pittsburgh even your rush hours are inferior,
people walk farther to catch a bus in New York
than some of your buses run between stops

Pittsburgh, that never met a quarterback it didn't hate
Pittsburgh, younger than springtime and older
than Miami Beach
Pittsburgh is the accountant who spills his soul
to the knarled waitress at the Gateway lunch counter
and when his wife asks him what's new
he says nothing

Pittsburgh where your artists look forward
to your stunned silence as a sign of approval
Pittsburgh where the worst curse is, "That's differnt."

Pittsburgh with the loudest voices and the least to say
Pittsburgh the last city in the civilized world
where the biggest drug problem is your young addicted
to chewing tobacco

Pittsburgh so sure you're no good
that you can't let anyone criticize you
Pittsburgh your dumb people are proud of it
and your smart people are paralyzed with their
feelings of inferiority
Pittsburgh where intelligence
is the sin of pride
and self-pity
is the pride of the city

Pittsburgh is the beauty of the Iron and Glass
Bank building on Carson Street, still standing
because there was no reason to
tear it down
Pittsburgh is staggering out of a neighborhood bar
and seeing the downtown skyline above
the roof of the five and ten
Pittsburgh is the beauty of the hills, savage
and soft, that nobody knows how
to talk about

Pittsburgh too honest to lie to job interviewers
like you're supposed to
Pittsburgh you didn't want your children
to study art and now your mills
are going to be museums, detached
aesthetics of a lost civilization
and its unconscious beauty

Pittsburgh with not enough middle class blacks
to support an NBA franchise
Pittsburgh no longer worth being on the hit list
for Russian missiles, so even after the apocalypse
you will still be the most livable city

Pittsburgh do you have kids just so you can
scream at them,
recapitulating your own denied pain
and killing them loudly
with your ugly song

Pittsburgh, afraid of your feelings and
justifiably so
Pittsburgh, is there light
at the end of your tunnels?
Pittsburgh, what's that signpost up ahead?
Pittsburgh, hiding from time in your shopping malls
Pittsburgh is the deer hunter who shoots
a drunken driver when he mistakes a Subaru
for a five point buck
Pittsburgh your innocence is infuriating
and the reason we need you
Pittsburgh where masculinity means
you have to hate cats
Pittsbugh your women spend thousands of dollars
on clothes and cosmetics, hairstyling and jewelry,
then blow the whole effect
with a nickel piece of chewing gum

Pittsburgh we are all frightened and so
we are all you
Pittsburgh so confused now but that's all right
-you were not so wonderful as you thought you were

Pittsburgh, peaceful city, human city, let's build
on the basics
instead of just going back to them
Pittsburgh is a Lifeflite helicopter to a hospital
which will refuse to treat you because you have no insurance
Pittsburgh, world center for ugly white people, how long
has this convention been going on?
Pittsburgh is umbrellas with long fingernails,
and buffalo with wings
Pittsburgh, born under the sign of
If You're So Smart How Come
You Ain't Rich?
Pittsburgh slow to change,
but slow to turn on you.