giant eraser in the DC sculpture garden

I am the most innocuous of celebrities
Pleaser of the most banal crowd
I can bring a smile to a person’s face
But what else?
How I wish that I could be
Like the others here
Or most of them, at least.

Across the park, a towering metal sheet reflects
The raised eyebrows, the
Creases bisecting foreheads
Behind which contain the flowing, whirling, grinding
Thoughts
Of the Russian tourists,
The families of four.

Then they turn and wander
Towards me, eyebrows succumb to gravity
Creases are smoothed out like wet clay
The stream of thought evaporates.

And then they come at me
With their peace signs and flash photography
Making a farce of my true wrath,
Crouching under stainless steel and cement.
How easy it would be to wiggle loose and
Erase that look
Right off their faces;
Masks of giddy horror of being crushed by
Such a mockery of scale.

I dwarf all of you
A tyrant in the garden
I would be a king if it was not for my shape:
For all the tons of stainless steel and cement,
I am still just a rubbery jester.