I Saw It On Television (The American Dream #2)

 At seventeen, though a hopeful young man,

I had no clue about living the American Dream.

I thought the American Dream was illusory. 

It existed in Disneyland, in the imaginations

of editors and magazine cover art,

in images of gender roles and success,

in the slogans of politicians,

the tough independence of the Marlboro Man;

Better living through Chemistry;

Progress is our most important product,

and twisted into other perverse advertising mantras.

There was something there I wanted

but I couldn’t explain what it was,

perhaps the desire for a secure future,

but the end of it all, of our collective innocence,

was when television showed the riots 

and bloodied heads; showed the Zapruder film

of President Kennedy’s assassination over and over; 

showed trampled dreams, 

bludgeoned civil rights, and the fiery-eyed 

youth in protest marches ready 

to dispense their own brand of assertiveness.

Mary Ann Vecchio became the symbol

of helplessness and anguish at Kent State,

and it put the Viet Nam War and body counts

into our living rooms and on our laps.

An entire way of life, however imagined,

was slaughtered before our very eyes,

exposing the hatred and violence 

of an America stirred from the bottom up,

exploding through the top.

From: Searching For Donna Reed,

Norman Rockwell, & The American Dream

Unpub. MS #2 of 5