Good Kindling ~ Poems by Virginia Lee Sprague

A man from Yugoslavia carries to Niagara Falls,

millions of dollars of worthless currency,

on which the image of Nicola Tesla is imprinted,

the inventor of the technology that first harnessed electricity,

Now pounded out by violent liquid,

as tourists take photos of the rainbows in the mists of the falls.

The man becomes a vendor of what is now only colorful paper,

for five dollars, the fat hand of a child from Newark,

can hold the face of the man who's science lights the world,

but whose name, thanks to Edison and his cronies, is barely known.

In the room of the Niagara Holiday Inn,

the child folds the bill into a ring, a paper airplane,

throws it at her brother, it rips when a tug of war ensues,

the children's grumpy heads are haloed by the light of a tacky motel lamp.

Across the world in Sarajevo,

a bare bulb dangles over a squinting medic,

a brother and sister quietly sit in stunned silence,

as they watch the medic attempt to close the wounds,

where once was the cheek of their grandmother,

shrapnel has graced this ancient face,

on which wet childish kisses once were planted.

The man makes a fortune,

selling the image of a dead scientist on a dead currency,

to Americans and Canadians whose children,

will never be hungry without hope of being filled,

or cold without possibility of warmth until Spring,

whose kid's fear of the dark can quickly be dispelled,

by the flick of a finger.

By the soft art deco glow of a lamp,

tastefully placed in a suite at the Ritz.

The man counts his money,

relieved, guilty, a stranger in a land,

of postcards, souvenirs, honeymoons, McDonalds,

a place where the word refugee is a lyric in a rock song,

"You don't have to live like a refugee.", Tom Petty wails.

The man will live well but will always remain,

a man without a country.

1997 -NPR