1: The Country of Previous Enthusiasms

The Country of Previous Enthusiasms

The grandeur of their Expos was familiar:

their pastime was commuter rail departing

from geodesic spheres, and grand arches built to span—

if only allegorically—disparate ideals.

The elders of our nation found it quaint.

Their designers were philosophers. Ours,

engineers. In their country, with its globular buildings,

and lanky, finned automobiles, the people

might have been happier, but we

have more efficient use of space.

They would chat with their neighbours about

such bric-a-brac, and visit their landmarks

in eager groups. When they finally reached

the age of shortage, overcome by harsher facts,

their assimilation was all but certain.

There could be no treaty. It isn’t just

the Apollonian need to set things square.

There was always so much waste, even in the way

they walked. Our incursion was immaculate.

We are a decent people who only wish to be correct.

Without Architecture

There would have to be another vision for occupying space,

new rituals for sitting and standing, for the physical interruption

of the planar world. No longer would we distinguish

between exist and inhabit. No asking where we live.

We live. Now to lug our dwellings like a hermit crab

or not. What would the word for shelter be?

Like cave or under-hang, or more like shade or company?

Two hundred words for horizon comprise an anthem.

Without walls, privacy would still occur, only wilder.

We would vote by standing upright, and emphasize

ourselves by raising our hands, lengthening our votes

as a challenge to the levelness of the meeting place.

Prisons would be nothing—but banishment theoretical and severe:

how best to find a cave or shade beyond the vanishing point?

And who goes there? It was the heretic and prodigy who said:

I can make a cathedral of my condition and worship there.

Without Agriculture

We’d have to rethink our investments—bearish

on the local trade. We never put much stock in that.

And reckless with our gratitude, assigning it

helter-skelter to the windfall and the kill.

Otherwise, we’d only have ourselves to thank.

But we’d be bullish on travel points and dining out.

And bad with names: no Mud Hens, no Netherlands.

Of course there would be more fundamental gaps.

Just tally up the unanswered questions: How

do you make a straight line run parallel to another?

What are the secrets of the integer and the abacus?

When does the accounting of an ox head lead to A?

Without roots, we’d find the answers here and there.

Here, the world would be our chocolate factory.

There, we wouldn’t have to settle for anything.