Where is Babylon? Find her
In a caffeine dream at the bottom
Of a frothing cappuccino --
Make it a double espresso,
You don't want to miss any of the
24 hour Safeway cinema multiplex
Helter skelter hustle of her laid-back days.
Look for her in the flocks of
Double-breasted gray Financial District pigeons
Roosting high in office windows,
Wheeling, dealing to an electronic pulse
While faxes hum and stutter, and there's
Tokyo on the phone, a thousand deals done.
Money changes hands in paper, plastic
Promissory notes from endless customer
And harried clerks squirm when shoppers'
Crumpled bills count short of all they need.
"Better put that jar of peanut butter back
On the shelf and while you're at it
Freeze the retirement benefits for
Old firemen and police. They're on the ballot
Every year the budgetocracy can't balance."
Campaigning interests squawk but none grow wiser.
Listen instead to the noontime neighborhood
Laughter that lifts the swings and
Slides down a rainbow of Babel's children
Who shed their sweatshirts
Oblivious to the foggy chill in their promised land,
Where scattered Fritos, french fries, popcorn, papers
Beckon the audacious gulls to screech
Their impatience at a ragged scavenger.
"Stir up the trash, old man, but
Leave the scraps for us!"
Despite their lawlessness, they know the limits,
The bounds across which Babylon can't reach.
They make their homes there on the
Black oil sands and watch the tideline
Drawn with bottlecaps, old drinking straws
And the collapsed entrails of human couplings.
Beyond Babylon lies only that reckless surf,
Whose deep, forgiving surge
Bears constant witness to the mortal storm.
(from archives)
