an old poem

This is at least 11 years old (if I find the date I’ll add it later).  It popped into my head when I was reading something about past perception of the “cities of the future”.  Certainly it was the internal cadence of “cities of <x>” that did the triggering work.  It’s weird when something triggers a memory of something I wrote, especially something this far back.   So I’m sharing:

The farmer and his earth

I saw a man on a hillside,
with a scythe.
And I saw that man wade into the sea.
I saw his arms
and they were strong
and yet he moved with the wind like a reed.
He swung his scythe
from left to right
and reaped all through the day.

And at night
when the stars leap into the sky
his strength spent at last, he steps onto the sand.
And lays on his back
and stares into the black
and lifts his arms, and turns his eyes over his hands.
And then I wonder
if he thinks in numbers
like me and the cities of my kind.
And I try to think
about what he must dream
but I get stuck, in the cities of my mind.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.