January, the month when people visit their travel agency for new plans, was the month I posted my first The War of the Worlds poem, feeling nostalgia for another place and time. Today I give you my final poem. Goodby to a long road of 80 manuscript pages.
A few final poems are posted here in my new (Since July) blog, all the rest, over the years, were in my retired old blog. Finished, at last.
Dramatis Personae:
“He” is the narrator, the journalist H.G. Wells
“His brother,” allows Wells to portray the horror of refugees on the road, Wells being the first writer to foretell them, years before people fled in the Great War of 1914…
Digression: Our ancestors had no words like “refugee” or “occupied,” because to them war was between two sets of “the king’s horses and men” and was NOT for civilians, meaning civilians transferred their loyalty to the winner. They would say, all at once, to avoid civil war: “The king is dead, long live the king!” The French WWII resistance workers, from this “civilians are innocent” point of view, therefore, were disloyal and NOT to be covered by the Geneva Convention: No surprise that roughly half of them were communists.
…“I” was a tourist doing a literature tour, tracing the path of the Martians from the first cylinder landing at Woking and on into London, up to the highest point, Primrose Hill, a hill “off the tourist maps” of Central London.
“Poets” in the next century, even as electronic devices abound, will surely still practise their age-old human art. Just as today, despite wearing hi fidelity Walkmans, people still sing.
…
…
Three Men in Three Centuries
In the lively London sun,
of the early 20th century:
His medical student brother strides along the blocks,
with strong confident legs;
from the Thames uphill to Regents Park is easy.
…
Under the tourist sun,
in the early 21st century:
I, the middle-aged man,
use the tube stations as a crutch,
walking with lengthening stride,
growing my strength.
City jigsaw pieces meet
and the vast scale snaps into focus.
To walk is to know.
…
In the early 20th century dead black-soot city:
The journalist Wells forces his way through Red Weed,
across empty Hyde Park and through silent spectral streets.
He huddles at night in fear.
In daylight he resumes his utterly lonely advance
towards Primrose hill.
…
In the early 21st century:
I walk with wonder
along the Regents Park canal, once choked with Red Weed,
I stroll past a handful of mothers pushing perambulators,
a rare jogger, and no one else.
I had imagined it would be crowded.
Primrose hill, with a flat round cement top, has a dozen quiet visitors.
None of them imagine
that dark pit of Martians.
I step softly to where the Martians were
I whisper, “The pit was right there.”
No one hears.
…
In the early 22nd century:
Surprisingly, Hyde Park still hosts Speakers Corner
where people legally spew outrageous opinions.
Young folk festooned with dark devices stand to hear real people.
A poet reads aloud, from The War of the Worlds.
…
…
Sean Crawford only a living human leaves a comment,
Under a wide prairie sky,
December 2020
