Is it the good turtle soup or only the mock? --Cole Porter
It’s only a paper-mache
moon, they say, too cool,
too full of interstellar space
to sympathize or care about
lovers, kings and fools.
Or is it? According to Deutsch
the so-called final ignition
into outer space
is a product of man’s meditations
moving, as if via gravitation
the magician to the other end
of the expanding universe. Sure,
in yr computer. Meanwhile, nursed
in a nursing home, mewling and peeing
as accurately predicted by Shakespeare
my old Marine, an ex-sailor, bitter
at life’s ending, having waited
too long to dispatch with dignity
all alone, as in Corbiere’s poem
where old soldiers are fated
to fight unnecessary wars
as we all are, except for the fact that
every helium and hydrogen atom
ever born or made (whatever you believe)
has taken positions, passionate
and predetermined as republicans and dobermans
over eons and epochs. Thus
I don’t think it behooves us much to fear
if we’re getting too little clean air or
bacteria are better adapted than us. This
obsession with identity, survival
a name and a leg of lamb is lame
even uninspired. The whole universe
including the professional basketball season
is canceled when yr dead. No blame.
Copyright 2013 by Robert Ronnow.