Oared through the sixth without a poem so there will be two on the seventh.

888

Before the motor car, before the wheel, the norm
as we knew it nettled with night stars, we hale
through thunderstorm and hail, surviving olive
and haystack, all invocation before nations
and nuthatches left us dizzy. Before Emile Zola,
the victrola, diet cola we didn't know the ton
and to stress test the bridge we walked across.
Before the cross, the coin toss, when it was jive
to sing and jingle to dance, when no one got old
but we were often cold as cows went to calve
without our knowledge and nobody went to college
we rested more and left the door open to rams.
Before the plague and buttress were the swarm
and to keep warm we burrowed into one another.