I wrote this for the Moss Piglet issue of Totems/Talisman, & Tschotkies” - (another bike trail poem that came to mind as I was riding. )
The Evolution of Look it Up
Kids today. When they want to know
they google it,
get fast facts from phones at their fingertips.
It only takes a few seconds
Wikipedia and You Tube.
When I was a kid, when we needed to know,
it was the World Book Encyclopedia.
Sold as a set, door to door,
an investment in your child’s
education …and… In. Their. Very. future.
Twenty hardcover volumes, deep red, faux leather
navy blue alpha letters printed
on the spine, outlined in gold.
The full set spanned a whole shelf in the den.
Shiny pages smelled of ink and gloss
the spine cracked a little when you opened
each new book; plus, there were photographs
and illustrations. Anything you wanted to know:
History. Science. Geography.
Medicine – the body - with diagrams!
My cousins had the new edition
cream colored, forest green
letters on the spine, embossed in gold.
We read those tomes cover to cover.
Years flipped by as fast as pages
when sequels of new discovery and invention
were published in a separate volume.
The day the annual Yearbook
was delivered we gathered,
with clean hands, to read about
new diseases, outer space,
the stuff of science fiction
happening now, then carefully slid
the new volume onto the shelf, next to W-Z
REVISION 08-03-2023 into a prose poem:
Look it Up
Kids today. When they want to know, they google it, get fast facts from phones at their fingertips. It only takes a few seconds on Wikipedia and YouTube. When I was a kid, when we needed to know, it was the World Book Encyclopedia. Sold as a set, door to door, an investment in your child’s education …and… In. Their. Very. future. Twenty hardcover volumes, deep red, faux leather, navy blue alpha letters printed on the spine, outlined in gold. The full set spanned a whole shelf in the den. Shiny pages smelled of ink and gloss, the spine cracked when you opened each book; plus, there were photographs and illustrations. Anything you wanted to know: History. Science. Geography. Medicine – the body - with diagrams! My cousins had the new edition, cream colored, forest green letters on the spine, embossed in gold. We read those tomes cover to cover. Years flipped by as fast as pages. Near the end of the year a sequel of new discovery and invention was published in an additional volume. The day the annual Yearbook was delivered we gathered, with clean hands, to read about new diseases, outer space, the stuff of science fiction – then, carefully slid the new volume onto the shelf, next to W-Z