The Sins of the Fathers

We excrete history.
Like snails, we trail
behind us the juice
of those who failed.

Cocoons are coffins,
threading our eyelids,
muffling our throats,
stilling the roar to a drip.

We are pinned to the cork
by echoes and shadows.
Tomorrow we grow beards.
Next week the cattle are slaughtered.

Like the Archeopteryx,
we build our nests
from threadbare dolls
and ancient cereal boxes.

We live a flickering rotoscope,
pedaling the same bicycle,
until death unties the knot,
and the monkey on the stick
falls to the floor.

David W. Aronson
July, 2000