This lovely building,
with its pool and hot-tub, gym and workshop,
pub and crafts room, gardens and fountain,
woods and salmon stream,
Skytrain and City Hall,
arts center, college,
miles of shopping and doctors,
police and politics,
schools and churches, all a mere block away or
even ensconced in the building,
security and all—oh!
How I loathe this lovely building!

The rhodos bloom uptight against their fence,
afraid to drop petal or leaf in the paths
of the masked men gunning away all signs of rot
with black noise drawn from Earth’s sleazy past.
Inside their plastic suits they are safe from thought.
Likely their headphones keep them in step,
block out the beeps and drones and roars
of the whitewashed, whirling dirt-dervish machines,
the phalanx of Progress just behind them.
Inside, the hallways crouch, sibilant as declawed cats—
no wonder the small dogs trot nervously, afraid to sniff
or whine; say anything that might spell d-o-g.
The pools, pockets of liquid poison, lie mostly undisturbed
below their posted rules, graceless , grammarless laws
against most kinds of human behavior.
No one speaks.

But somewhere in the world, even here,
it’s a glorious, sunny day.
I’ll sit on the balcony with tea and a book;
ignore the noise.
Run a finger down the table, cleaned yesterday,
to be sure it’s clean enough.
Black as ink.

I loathe this lovely building.

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