AIR CONDITIONED

From my fat chair

I can see through the bay window

that the robins and wrens are replaced

by shoals of starlings that wheel and

turn like anonymous faces at the Metro.

They lean their iridescent black into an

empty wind from up the street. Soundless.

No one seems to notice the

absence of red breasts, but then

I wonder if those clouded eyes

see anything at all.

They, we, I... find solace in all

that ultra-high definition where 

we have lived too long to turn 

back. Resistance is futile 

hooked up to cables and wire,

all our thoughts upholstered in

unnatural cloth.  

We do not know what is in

the dirt under our fingernails,

have never heard of loam, never

skinny dipped in a cold creek,

or killed the meat we eat.

On the other side of the glass that

amoebic formation of starlings has

taken its great crusade elsewhere,

probably as someone’s screen saver.

OH! Wait!

Where is my remote?

Reviews

[Lara]

What is more, "we" barely know what electricity is either, and how the convenience is knitted through our very walls. Infact, seems darned ironic. Inverted (pardon the pun).
So now, the nearest we might get to organic experience is to feel the longing for it and eulogise... Some of us, anyway. For many there is yet the finger tip convenience (like our light switches) of deferring to chat gpt or grok for the pretence. And so much more's the pity, hence.

[Vol]

Lara,
There is a real argument that the lack of true "organic" experiences is a source of much modern day maddness. I wrote a paper once on the consequences of urbanization... Back in the late sixties, and early seventies Africa saw much of the continent and all the nations move to towns. Most of my sources for that paper came from psychological studies of what that did to the psyches of those folks. What they found was a dramatic, almost geometric growth of every mental disorder they had a name for. My conclusion is that all modern city dwellers are crazy... but to the same degree so no one notices.
Meanwhile Within a ten mile radius of my home there are not a thousand people..., I sure could use a downtown, coffeeshop, open mic reading...
Gah! I'm dieing here!.
Vol

[Lara]

I, for one, believe it vol. I've lived with feet in both constructs, hokey-pokey'd and turned around, all that... and find it fruitful, never the less, to "lose the mind and come to your senses" whatever the sky line.

Life and communities pressed into long algebraic equations are sure to scramble the eggs somewhere along the line - so horribly, too, that even a dog won't want to touch it.

With all that said, there is strange comfort in the early morning sound of a garbage truck coming to collect for you and the neighbours...

[Vol]

Lara,
Where have you been all this time?
I lovewalking on the wild side when I know the closing time... There are so many things to do to remain connected. Barefolkot on the grass, swim in a lake, body surf, get high and listen to complicaterd music, having a tight group of outrageous friends for a good night out...
But then making connections is a mere shadow of entanglement... the web is infinite.
Meantime, as the Navajo say, "Walk in Beauty."
Vol

[Pete]

ouch. quite the wakeup call. i often wonder if we will become so advanced that we will start going backwards. i was born too late, give me the simple life. delightful read with a pinch 'tween cheek and gum to chew on. as i've said before, how can we have artificial intelligence when we've not yet had the real thing?

[Michael Sun Bear]

Good evening Vol, I pretty much like everything you write so no surprise I like this. I guess I have been fortunate. Growing up we biked down to the local river and swam in our cutoffs, as a teenager I skinny dipped in a forest lake with aging hippies. Many, many, many a year I worked in soil, planting, nurturing. I certainly know what loam is. I am old, crippled up, and I appreciate the high def content cable brings me. I am a real movie buff, among other things. It enriches my now mostly sedentary life, but I have not lost my love, nor my awareness of nature. Like you, I watch it out my window, but I also go out and visit nature, in parks, in long drives into the mountains, renting a cabin (I had to finally give up tent camping). Are we the final generation that can claim those joys of our younger years? MSB