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This poem is taken from PN Review 173, Volume 33 Number 3, January - February 2007.

Manhattan Morning John Barr


I. The Mirror of Arcadia

You know how it is in August in New York.
Summer over, the populace returns.
From old houses on the Cape
lawyers return to the temperament of neckties.
From the chardonnays of island hideaways
traders return, their animus renewed.
From tranquil gossip on the Jersey shore
to idle gossip on the trains, we all return.

You know how it is. The news boy tends
his hundreds of small relationships,
the Stock Exchange its googles of worm-wired trades.
With doming regularity the shells
of exquisite dynamos pulse power, the wheels
of the city mend and turn, the gear box makes.
...


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