Category: control

how far you go

leeward
to peas beans melons cantaloupes asparagus crabs oysters
orchards picnics
sick sailors immigrants dying contagious with mary
suburban mirage manguano cannery company town
baseball beer dancing burlesque
manufactury refinery petrolasphaltchemicalpool rails
gastank smokestack waste
liberty victory jumboizing containerizing
community clutching sandymuddyoiled rubbishroad
to fairfieldbrownfield
and beyond
to pleasant prospect adventure utopia
sweating river

brdge at sunrise
(in 1916 the hanover street bridge, now vietnam veterans memorial bridge, over the middle branch of the patapsco, replaced the long bridge between light street and fairfield)

quarantine

enforced
great change in the physical aspect of baltimore
isolation
was brought about by the removal of the buildings along saint paul
limit
cleared into a series of sunken gardens
infection
elaborate stairways
into lonely places

lonely place at sunrise
(in 1914 a thriving, predominantly black neighborhood around saint paul street between lexington and center streets was razed as mayor preston innovated baltimore apartheid)

once and future plunderbund

trade laws enrich rich
commercial conspiracies menace from a twilight zone in nation-state
unreasonable campaign contributions corrupt
overissues of stocks and bonds suppress legitimate investment
favored banks exploit
wage earners rights regarded as restraints
special privilege interests absorb and waste natural resources
impure foods compromise health
imperialism experiments abandon values
special interests misuse delegated power usurp government
begin to begin to begin again

armory at sunrise
(the 1912 democratic convention was held at the fifth regiment armory on bolton and preston streets and adopted a progressive platform)

vast assemblage

in happy land
fortresses burn
schemes of bondage
storm
breaks rock in loud applause
peace and safety
find

armory to west at sunrise
(the fifth regiment armory on bolton and preston streets, built in 1901 and dedicated in 1903, hosted civic events and conventions, including the northeastern saengerbund shortly after its dedication)

common enemy

in a rain of flowers and cheers
our soldiers fire on people in the streets
between the buildings on the pavement
echo chamber roar
squeezes blood
out of eyes ears nose lungs
briefly faintly tinting the coastal waters
traces of anthropocene

mount royal station at sunrise
(in 1898 the massachusetts sixth, successor to the same regiment attacked by baltimore residents 37 years earlier, marched from the b&o’s recently opened mount royal station to camden station, cheered by citizens enthusiastic about the start of a war with spain)

our most sanguine expectations

a beautiful white villa in the glade on the hill
as symmetrical as mercantile interests and power
evaporates like conversations forgotten
and repeating

montebello at sunrise
(general samuel smith, of montebello near the alameda and 33rd streets, exercised power politics at the local, state, and national levels through the first four decades of the 19th century)