September 11, 2001

Istvan Hesslein
[ihesslein@thewritegallery.com]


Gershwin's gay garish Gotham 

today has joined the ranks 

 of Gaia's tragicopoles, 

London, Dresden, Gdansk 


for evermore. 


An unhallowed razor, 

thrust, 

so savagely, 


into the apple`s core. 


But please, 


spare us the braying 

of the semioticians of symmetry. 


Let them stay huddled, 

paretically, 

 in Zeno's corner, 

ruminating, 

endlessly, 

on the etymology and etiology 

the means/ends mission statements 

of "horror, " and "counterhorror," 

full frontal, lateral, and collateral, 

the feudal bloodline 

of our selfish genes, 

even unto the Big Bang, 


while we chew instead 

on whether high-tech sociopathy 

and low-tech superstition 

were indeed always slated 

to win the day, 

eventually, 

in life's no-sin, no-sum game 

of Gaussian roulette.