Semi-formal Deformations in America

If it’s August, then it must be time to help move my daughter. That’s been the case every year for the past 6 years, except last year. But this year is different. Oh sure, Beverly and I helped move her last Saturday. But she’s finished her Master’s program and is beginning her foray into the real world. And what is the real world you may well ask. Well I guess it’s that world where Achilles actually catches up to the tortoise without any infinitesimal concepts getting in the way. Whoa, there she goes, passing her slower dad on the way to the gods know where. Godspeed. And look out for those potholes.

Sonnet August Twelve

In present America, there is
no infinite. There’s only the middle man,
the shortest route between a small appliance
and Detroit, the marketing of Pan
with some mercurial appetite for spotless
stainless stolen goods a bargain made
in heaven helpless less than perfect now
with future overworked and underpaid
the credit cards in catastrophic comedies
midsummer tempests much ado to merchants as you like
the mortgages the luxuries the lexuses and nexuses
inside the advertisements salaried to soothe and psych
it’s business usual and customary
waiting for your beneficiary.

~Son Rivers 2005