SLAM!

The city chews on folk. I’ve heard her grinding noises,
Late into the night, and even sometimes in the afternoon.
I've seen her just-dead carcasses, too,
Strewn like dead flies, or matchsticks all used up.
They reek of dried-up urine and garbage left to rot.
But even the living, in their pale zombie casks of skin,
Walk about like graying shadows of substance.

The city bellows and sighs with retched sadness,
As if weeping for a lost love -- or her next sacrifice,
Dispersing grunts between strange siren blasts and piercing screams,
The echoes permeate each sagging wall,
Each graffitied stamp of pain.

The city is a monstrous demon who sucks away each person’s vigor.
I have seen that from the darting looks
Of the half-dead city dwellers as
They peer from squinting, shuttered eyes,
Nervously waggling their long, skinny necks,
While mumbling chants like brown-robed monks,
Wrapped in wires that intrude their ears.

I have been to that far city, Children.
I swear to you I've seen these visions.

Glaring eyes peer down from each cloud-topped, metal building,
In moonlit shadows or summer's blinding days.
And the concrete of garbage-littered streets burns the feet,
While each blinding breath of air tastes of acid and stings the lungs.

But take note, the worst of it -- is the days of mists,
When black tar smoke pours forth from her angry smokestack nostrils.
Then, even in the blessed springtime,
When all here blooms in hyacinths and tulips,
The city wears only pale, pasty greens
And her trees droop rusty-hued, limp branches.

So heed me, Children; listen well.
The city sups and drains one's soul and heart.
She corrodes all quiet joy and peace.
Never stray from our green and quiet pastures,
Or leave behind the sweetness of this, our rural paradise.

I go to the city with dread and only because I must.
Yet each time I journey forth, I clutch my purse,
Fasten my eyes on our brighter sky,
And head home on speedy legs.