Neon-coat childhoods
belie the gray adult life
of all its people.
Just as the stone-hewn
face of the dark Previous
was unprepared for the Now:
wind-up, chrome
and chic above all else.
Yes, indeed.
What citizenry!
No opinion but for diary
and entire days and lives
to offer to the Group.
Little cogs twist and reel
for a reason.

But they draw no criticism from me.
As they have, through utmost
consideration, neutered the mass
by cutting at individual.
And kept poetry alive through
the fear and the strange and the
Bombs.
It lives in every word and
look and leaves blacker
features, all minor imper-
fections out of sight,
like an unsightly
pair of shoes.