Scoundrel Time

INFRASTRUCTURE

Whoosh like a river moving but it’s a highway
of electricity making its way along strung lines.

Teams and teams of men did this, forged and hung
rubbery, waterproof cables. The chemicals it took:

plastic coating and metal filaments to carry our current. We said yes,
malignancy – come to us and be with us, raising our arms

in wide offerings as on a ridge when sun arrives. Yes, we said
to telecommunications. In the gullies and broad expanses

of grain, the meadow (then, we had meadows), rolling
mountain, and jagged mountain. Take this

black cord and pull it taut across your body. We always called out—
Look, a Lady’s Dress! and there she stood, the tower

surrounded by a cut-away swath of land lacking trees. Tall but quite alone
letting us speak to one another all the way from there to here.

 

 

 

 

Image By: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Electricity_pylons_in_California#/media/File:Power_Industry_(13826276284).jpg