Fin de Siècle

All that I wander through, so bright, so modern, So quick with novelty, so very wise, So dernier cri, so ne plus ultra, this, All this, all this, I come to realize, All of a sudden, is not mine at all, Is not my Now, but some one else's Then. There will be other women, other men, Appropriating this, still bright, but small, Garish and glazed, of colored post-card size, So little that it goes from hand to hand For the delight of those who know and praise Our customs, our décor and these our days: "How irresistible! How charming!" so Runs their gay comment on their long ago. Secure, and, what is even better, chic, These lovers of the chromium antique Will pride themselves because they understand.

Forgive their trespasses. If we resent Being considered quaint and innocent, Remember—they will know, beyond a doubt, How all the things that frightened us came out, And, for their own anxieties, will cast The light of certainty around the past,

Impute to others what they dare not claim, The opposite of sorrow, guilt, and shame, And even when most dubious will know One more advantage, which might possibly Conduce to smugness. They will surely be, Past any contradiction, still alive In Nineteen ninety three, and four, and five.