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“Go long,” you say, “get open,” though you mean
Why don’t you tie your sorrows to your saddlebow
and ride singing forth?—and so I set off, gone beyond
the last bus stop, its shelter idling, and continue
past the moon landing staged in a barn
the government has blacked out and starred
with phosphor. I keep going, past the last whalers,
sea-town inns, and verge-of-the-afterlife churches
clergied by sailors the ocean spewed back, I reach
the harbor where townsmen jettison the cargo
of tea leaves, I travel waters where the Armada lies
foundered from cannon breach and scupper. I go
past Chaucer’s company returning, their contest forgotten
as the inn approaches. I go past the 15-foot walls
of the Tower of London, to the battle at Hastings
where the Normans give ground yard by grudging yard
in an illusion of flight that becomes rally and charge,
and here “Go long, get open” is good for “Stand firm,”
for “To the death,” and when I call “Let fly,” you do,
arrow or pigskin lost in the sun, and I’m waiting
and waiting, and you wouldn’t believe the far I’ve gone.
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Browse back issues of The Atlantic that have appeared on the Web. From September 1995 to the present, the archive is essentially complete, with the exception of a few articles, the online rights to which are held exclusively by the authors.
See All Back Issues: September 1995
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The Pseudo-Suburbanist's Dilemma
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