the fossil record

<<11>>

How Television

Became the Antennae of the Race

The first TVs were made of stone,

old milk cartons, Tinker Toys,

drunken bats without radar

incapable of catching gnats

at night flying blind between

three channels.

Every night a nation of fathers

up on roofs twisting antennae

shouting down "Can you see anything?"

These guys won the war

and we made them tromp around

over the living room aiming aluminum

in the direction of Saturday Night Fights,

Liberace, The Flintstones.

A milk run was dropping bombs

on civilians, but this was worse,

this was taking orders from children,

wives, stepping on cat shit on tar paper

and cursing newspapers bleaching

in the sun. Reception was god,

but who knew how the images

got from New York and Los Angeles

to our living rooms, we only yelled

up reports to our fathers on the roof,

GI Joe in a red rage twisting the cage

toward broadcast towers neither of us

could see, remembering the mud

and Italian whores with fondness.

DavidThornbrugh