Much of the relational past.
How long has this been going on?
If you’ve visited Merriam-
Webster online you may have seen
That the first known use of the term
Was in 1887.
Seems rather recently to have
Become part of standard grammar.
Some boomers had grandparents born
Right around then—all of them gone
Long, long since, but still in living
Memory. People must have been
Deploying past participles
Plus have a long time before that,
They had to have had. Notice how
This has begun to feel faintly
Ludicrous? This poem has waited
Well before you encountered it,
The words and some of the phrases
In it have already gone back
To being parts of other texts,
Other conversations,
After having themselves waited
To collapse into these patterns
However many centuries,
To reach a perfect present tense.
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