"Almost necessarily . . ."

"As civilization advances, poetry almost necessarily declines."
                                                    Thomas B. Macaulay, (1800-1859)

Despite advances, my Southern town embarrassed me

the night a traveling poet offered verse.
One would think the simple task of lights staying on,
barring thunder strike or worthy catastrophe
were accomplishable, more easily fixed
than the feedback loop squalling its complaint
politely ignored like an infant on a plane.
The technical failure of flickering lights
independent of region (Northern lights have failed too)
embarrassed nevertheless as diminished hospitality,
a wire crossed, a breaker failed,
old wires overdue—

Civilization should have increased our ability to host
an event we bribed college students to attend
“almost necessarily” as Macaulay warned
the smart-phoned freshmen on hiatus from their text,
while necessarily those waiting most patiently,
without conversation, holding most tightly to their seats
used advances in hearing aids and heart pace monitors
to amplify the poetry in their falling years,
a symmetry of advance and decline.
 
I would like to know what the poet saw, from her stand,
an audience present then fading,
her thoughts when the lights failed on her text,
continuing from words she’d written elsewhere,
seamlessly, to the mixed ages flickering in then out,
a voice that held, needed.  Necessary.                                                                                   


                                                                                         for Natasha Trethewey
                                                                                                                                                     June 21, 2012