WAKING UP

by Alan Britt

If I woke up
in a house, post WW II,
Tampa, 1956,
walls half-painted,
plastered, of course,
by wisdom enthusiastically delivered
via radio,
do you think I'd still
embrace
a suffering cello,
or do you imagine
that our new mushroom horizon
should include every poet
living on this planet
to be the freest
of citizens
howling in protest
before a stainless-steel General Electric toaster
reflecting our country's innocence
like a sentimental mirror
held up
before the wicked Queen
in a Brother's Grimm fairy tale?