the parade

a few years ago
lost in a traffic
jam in washington
dc. you took a wrong
turn and another
wrong turn and ended up
at the front of a
barricade where a cop
on a horse
put his leather
gloved hand out
and told you to stop.
you can't move
until the parade
is over, he said
behind his dark
sunglasses, his
crazy big horse
staring you down too.
what parade you said?
searching the streets.
and then it began.
cowboys
and indians,
whooping it up
with drums and cap
guns. men in long gowns
and wigs, sashaying
to and fro,
like marelene dietrich
and greta garbo.
men in diapers holding
bottles,
sucking on binkys,
craddling teddy bears.
men dancing on the back
of flat bed trucks,
gyrating to donna
summers, shaking it
in short cut
off jeans.
then the leathered
men arrived in shiny black,
muscled with mustaches
and goatees,
the boas, the sequins.
the sassy screams
and chants.
it was a long parade.
interesting, but not
your cup of tea. perhaps
next time you thought,
you'd take the
rock creek parkway,
around.