So much depends,
Williams wrote,
on a red wheelbarrow
glazed by rainwater.
I hasten to add
that not every member
of the society from
which he composed
those lines has traded
in the wheelbarrow
for a combined harvester.
Some of us purport
still to read on paper
and write with ink.
A rare animal, Man,
nostalgic and sweet
while the planet
burns under his foot,
although the print
would be lighter
If we give up paper
and make poems
in memory like
the old bards whose
prodigious refrains
are getting lost
in characters
touched on the I-pad.
April 20, 2012