The Long March

We are prisoners of commerce
wrapt lovingly in arms
of electronic warmth
by the smokestack queen mother
of our plastic desire--
A neon colony
shooting our fluorescent dreams
into the heavens
like headlights invading
a still dark

We have forgotten the soft whisper of pines,
Forgotten the field's gentle sway--
dancers beneath the stars
with minds unclouded by
the cancer of billboard dreams

Who was that person who first became discontented
lounging beneath night's gentle movements?
Whose ears desired more than
river-song
mingled with the lark?
Who was it that began the long march
toward a silicon god,
toward metallic perfection--
a mathematical equation,
everything in
inhuman symmetry
with no room left
for the flesh howl?--
The world of Progress
made complete
with one last
skyward-pointing tomb