468 and 469

My dear Ravine on Riverside, how are

you now? Are there fewer motorbikes?

Are your marsh sediments yet still the bar

of more like me who once drove by your dikes?

It’s been awhile since I wandered by.

E’en when I visited your valley last

I rode not where your lucid waters lie.

I did not want to repeat what is past.

O hallowed road, O bridge between two lives,

O portal I shall not take lone again,

when we shall meet, if fate such thing contrives,

I shall see, in you, something new therein:

you offered me a better world that day,

but I am glad I made the choice to stay.

~~~

Do not allow them to make use of it,

nor any part of it allow them room,

lest by your periled paritous permit

you find a deepened, dismal, dreaded doom.

For smudges on your most auspicious things

will be wanton if you admit to yield.

Their handling, the highest offense brings

to that which you must never let them wield.

They may appreciate that which you hold,

but let them hold it not a second long.

They will not see how their fingerprints scold

them, but you will. Keep away what shan’t belong.

Let these be never touched, but only seen:

your own computer mouse, keyboard, and screen!