Travels | St. Louis

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St. Louis

© 2010, 2016, 2020 Vernon Miles Kerr, vernonmileskerr.com

What on Earth can compare to the Arch?

No superlative is adequate.

Nothing prepares you for that first glimpse,

No travelogue, no picture in the Nat. Geo.

Soaring above the downtown skyscrapers,

Its satin-silver face reflects

The sky and clouds,

And the river,

That Old Man River.

Your first thoughts are

Who conceived this;

Who planned this;

Who approved it?

How many minds had to meld

For a city to accomplish this?

Millenia later archaeologists will theorize,

“Something significant happened here.”

Yes, but not so much “Westward Expansion,”

But more: human cooperation.

I stop at a signal light

And wait while a tidalwave of red-shirted fans

Crosses and flows toward Busch.

“Gotta support those Cards.”

One senses in St. Louis

A spirit of community, of egalitarian concern

For everyone’s pleasure, everyone’s edification:

The famed Zoo has no admission fee

Neither does the Art Musum

Nor the Science Museum

There are even free seats at

Forrest Park’s Summertime Opera.

When the project ends, I head West on 70.

An elastic memory stretches out behind;

It won’t break.

Someday it will yank me back to St. Louis.