MARGARET ATWOOD - Plasticene Suite (2ª parte) - Dearly

 

PLASTICENE SUITE (cont.)

 

6. SORCERER'S APPRENTICE

You know the old tale:
a machine made by the Devil
that grinds out anything you wish for
with a magic word

and some idiot wishes for salt,
and out comes the salt, more and more,
but he failed to get a handle
on the charm to turn it off

so he throws the thing into the sea,
and that's why the sea is salt.

The Sorcerer's Apprentice-
it's the same story: Go is easy,
Stop is the hard part.
In the beginning no one thinks about it.
Then Wait is too late.

In our case the sorcerer is dead,
whoever he was to begin with
and we've lost the instructions

and the magic machine grinds on and on
spewing out mountains of whatnot
and we throw it all into the sea
as we have always done
and this will not end well

7. WHALES

Everyone cried when they saw it
in the square blue sea of the TV:
so big and sad

a mother whale
carrying her child
for three days, mourning
its death from toxic plastic,

So big and sad
we can hardly grasp it:
how did we do this by just living
in the normal way,

maneouvring our way through
package and wrapping,
cutting our way to our food
through the layer by layer that
keeps it fresher,
and doesn't everyone?

What happened before?
How did we ever survive
with only paper and glass and tin
and hemp and leather and oilskin?

But now there's a dead whale
right there on the screen:
so big and sad
something must be done.

It will be! Will it be?
Will we decide to, finally?

8. LITTLE ROBOT

This is the little robot
they have just invented
with its cute dollface of soft plastic.
Its expression is confiding
though slightly fearful:
it's designed to learn like a child.

We give it objects:
it fingers them, explores,
it bites and questions,
it plays with them, absorbs.
Then it gets bored
and drops things on the floor. 

There might be breakage,
maybe eaven whimpering.
Does it care?
Have we really gone that far?

It's learning like a child:
how to predict -they tell us-
likely future events:
This will cause that.

Little dollface robot,
what will you make of yourself
in this world we are making?
What will you make of us?
Where will you bestow yourself
when you are obsolete?
On what cosmic trashheap?
Or will you live forever?
Will we become your ancestors,
rapacious and tedious?
Or will you erase us?
Will you drop us on the floor?
Would that be better?

9. THE BRIGHT SIDE

But look on the bright side,
you say.
Has there ever been such brightness?

Has there ever been a flower as bright
that has lasted as long as this?
In winter snow, after a funeral?

Has there ever been a red as red,
a blue as blue?
And so inexpensive too!

Has there ever been a bucket
as light as this, to carry water
into the villages?

Why should we use the heavy one
so easily broken?
Not to mention the orange canoe.

As for your voice, two thousand miles away
but as clear as whistling, right in my ear-
how else could it get here?

Don't tell me this is not beautiful-
as beautiful as the day!
Or some days.

Will it be burn or drown?
Though we've forgotten the incantation,
the chant, the dance,
we invoke a vertical ocean,
pure blue, pure water.
Let ir come down.

Plasticene Suite. Dearly. Chatto & Windus. Penguin Random House UK. 2020. Margaret Atwood.