Packaging Era

Once upon a time, the world was like this.
Helicopters landed on swanky lawns
To deposit well-to-do hotel guests.

Helicopters shot at people below
And were shot down themselves in the war zones.
Helicopters rescued lost backpackers,

Reported on the traffic and weather,
Ferried celebrity politicians,
Musicians, and athletes, some of whom died

In infamous helicopter crashes.
And that’s not half what helicopters did,
But helicopters were the least of it.

It was just like that in the world those days.
Everywhere, humans packaged everything
Including humans, in noisy machines

That floated and juddered around the world,
Crisscrossed the proverbially crisscrossed
Lanes of oceans, superhighways, tunnels

Under mountains, dirt tracks over mountains,
Rails parting monoculture waves of grain,
And that packaging packaged packaging—

Shipping containers of shrink-wrapped boxes,
Jet holds and overheads crammed with luggage,
The jets roaring over Antarctic ice.

Every kind of transported packaging,
Like every kind of loud machine transport,
Had multiple competitive uses

In war or peace, racketing back and forth,
Sometimes with more people packaged in them,
More often packing more goods or weapons.

Those helicopters were just typical,
Whether carrying or killing people,
Of that noisily packaged world back then.