The long, green-feathered grasses, after recent rains
have ranged themselves in angles over swathes I cleared
as all life does with borders, beautifying edges;
and yes, I pruned some branches of the maple;
trees untended will simply grow into each other,
indeed, as I have let these apples and pears.
A lazy, minimalist gardener, perhaps,
but, considering vigilance in social guise,
I'd focus on what standards should be maintained:
let's say, empathy, compassion, common decency;
but for hosts of prescriptions and proscriptions
that holler 'Come ye out from among them!' Let THEM go.
Most religions and nigh all sects, I mean of course,
all that picky maintenance of mores of tribes,
fraternities, classes that drag their huge baggage -
mobile barricades deployed in the everyday.
'But,' you will object. 'This is to destroy culture;
to let ancient traditions perish.' Whatter?
I'm all in favor of flavor, of song and dance
and food and drink. Love traditional recipes -
deplore restrictive rules and practices applied
from farm to table to make sure no one sits there
but fellow cultists. Though I'd love History
to swallow certain cultural matters down straight
(despite a little indigestion there, no doubt),
let Time dissolve those ties that rope us far apart:
there is one human race, one human heart.
