Ancient Cities Call


Modern folk with programmed eyes:
     Do you see what I see
     (my progeny and mad dogs)
     beyond the vacant lot,
     beneath the tire tread?

Ancient Cities call, with your dry dusts,
     and your cool suns.
     Your ghosts of tongues.
     (Where are you stationed 
     mathematically?)

When ledgers shall have been balanced
     and martinis all consumed,
     exquisite sunsets over skyscrapers shall steal,   
     the last metal-busting car wreck
     gloamed away.

Then will dinghies draw softly over water;
     Will ancient peoples on deck parade;
     Will muffled paws pad,
     extinct birds assemble;
     on the Other shore.

As Modern Cities jive, with their callous blasts,
     and their acrid smells,
     their jangling wires:
     Are they, too, ghost to some 
     millenium?

         Ancient Cities Call


Modern folk with programmed eyes:
     Do you see what I see
     (my progeny and mad dogs)
     beyond the vacant lot,
     beneath the tire tread?

Ancient Cities call, with your dry dusts,
     and your cool suns.
     Your ghosts of tongues.
     (Where are you stationed 
     mathematically?)

When ledgers shall have been balanced
     and martinis all consumed,
     exquisite sunsets over skyscrapers shall steal,   
     the last metal-busting car wreck
     gloamed away.

Then will dinghies draw softly over water;
     Will ancient peoples on deck parade;
     Will muffled paws pad,
     extinct birds assemble;
     on the Other shore.

As Modern Cities jive, with their callous blasts,
     and their acrid smells,
     their jangling wires:
     Are they, too, ghost to some 
     millenium?