♠ Poetry Sketches A to D ♠

Detroit (xvi) 'cadillac'

[ASR] Originally the west end of Lake Erie was all mudflats. Cadillac gave the city its name from 'the place of the strait'.

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Detroit

(xvi)

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In the shallows of Lake Erie
mud sucks for millenia
until we drain the flats and put down planks
to cross this fertile muck
that gathers below the straits
between Saint Claire and Erie.

On the banks of ancient villages
it takes the name that Cadillac bestowed:

'le place du detroit.'

Three hundred years would pass until his name
would be given back,
stamped uopn the head of a horseless carriage.

Now cadillacs motor down the flats
to other cities
where mud had been baked to brick
and concrete poured to pave the roads.


Kåre Enga

catalogue number: [162.466]
17 oktober 2005