flying on broomsticks with
technology speed

they come banging thru Greenwich St. dawns
to rip out old pipes every cobble stone of
a horse galloping age in lower Manhattan
my adopted home,
trees put in wooden cages to protect them;
no way to shut out the percussion-sound
of jackhammers drills
the promises to put back the cobble stones
hammering in my head
in the false evening quiet
the lie: nothing has changed
we’ve lost nothing....
true
nothing has


Puritan ghosts off the Mayflower
still holding up the BOOK the only BOOK
the threat of hell-fire damnation
same as in Salem,
as in McCarthy’s America
in Cyber space now:
we give them permission to kidnap our minds
give up passwords to our lusts our privacy
what keeps us human-alive
beg Net Nanny & Cyber Patrol
to save our children from the devil
free us of sin


& brag about progress
& living in the 21st century....


a lie like the cobble stone cover-up
outside my window
like my lover’s return after five years
swearing sobriety with old words
& familiar excuses / same love:
bodies don’t lie;
found again on a virtual road
waiting for us
like the first time nearly 10 years ago
an accident not accidental
but doesn’t bring him back
cannot return us to us



only thing certain:
nothing is the same
everything is
 

 
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 © 2000 Linda Lerner