AMERICAN HISTORY X

for Marina Roy

no mark is so anonymous as to obscure what lies behind it

in science the symbol x is a variable, an "unknown value to find"

the X on my keyboard hides that x, while its capitalization, with help

from my SHIFT function, was the choice of X. J. Kennedy, the poet

an obliteration of his first name, Charles, to distinguish himself

from Boston's Joseph P. Kennedy, unlike the S in Harry S. Truman

who became president where Joseph P. failed, the S standing not

for variability -- the names of his maternal and paternal grandfathers --

but for what mattered most to Joseph P., and that is patriarchy