The Bicameral Eyeball

        No one noticed that it was midnight out.
	The tools to make the tools were forthcoming.
	It wasn’t so much that we were afraid of farting
	as that other thieves had gotten wind of his maladdress.
	She was startling in her new headdress.
	Oodles of trolls performed the funeral litany—
	hey, it wasn’t their turn at the fo’c’sle, so why
	be perturbed ahead of time, and too late?  The factory
	whistle blew and released all the workers inside
	who came crowding down along the pavement.
	 
        As though walking on stilts people blew up in amazement
	like pieces of trash a wind desultorily lifts,
	then returns for no visible reason.  We were all tired
	and happy, plodders on life’s great thoroughfare.
	None of us were in it for the long haul, but paradoxically
	all of us were, we just didn’t know it yet.  But when I
	looked over at her I could see why they meant sadness,
	not from any bereavement, but growing like a stem
	in otherwise barren ground.  Oh, sure, there was plenty of majolica
	on buffets in those days, chafing dishes with lids
	to be lifted and then put back again.  There were mild
	pools in the woods far from any stream, and ant-size
	buggies patrolling the slopes.  Good thing for you
	it was too.  That they were there.  Or just on the threshold
	of being, like a dream.  I told you not to be a gnat
	about things, that sooner or later worrying would grow up
	to become part of experience.  It was just that you
	seemed to believe me when I wasn’t being especially serious.
	 
        That and the tens of revolutions to come. I say,
	shall we go inside?  The combination of rain and sunshine
	always finds me defeated, and then other causes come along,
	seeking attribution.  Meanwhile if he matriculates
	in one to ten years, who’s to say I’m not stodgy either?
	It was all we could do, her and I, to keep from laughing
	at his strife.  Meanwhile the fire burned bright.
	The maids grew petulant.
	But I don’t care, really, none of us could
	as long as time brings up the rear, placing a napkin,
	folded just so, over the era and whatever it
	thought it was up to.  Now doesn’t that make a lot of sense?