Not So Great
the fathers invoked a heraldry of the linear,
eschewing the lessons of Creation.
the fathers crammed nighttime into a blue box
of corralled stars.
blood doesn’t flow so straight, nor ivory.
beware those tongues and teeth.
beware the lunge below the glint of the square cyclops eye.
beware the cubic tyrannosaur of the-many-into-one.
imagine
if the whitewashed blood and fangs and dark gleams,
and the shallow sharp bursting bombs of flare,
fell into a chastened pile.
all those vectors of Manifest Destiny
humbled to salute the coils of riverbanks,
and the curled claws of wild willow roots.
would the dark deeds eventually decay
through the soil toward those killed in their name?
would the symbolism then
form a sediment of eternal regret?
would it even, finally, flower a decent destiny?
surrender to a supple, graceful peace
its indivisible bars?
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