innocuous
when you say it
like this:
our prehistoric
antecedents—
those eagerest primitive
pieces of us—
were thermodynamic
processes,
catabolic molecules, made
to break down acceleration;
they ate up time
and distances
and breathed out rates
of change
in increasingly warm
and rapid waves, til
the great grid of tireless
innovation caught fire—
then the tires
of the car—
then the back seat—
then the kids.
