highway prettification’s been a problem
since appius claudius cæcus
decided to move his legions
faster, farther, and more efficiently
in all these years—
nay, millennia—
of highway engineering,
only romans invented
a decent landscaping program
romans planted romans
along the shoulder of the appian way
in single-eyebrowed mausoleums,
sprawling columbaria that the slaves kept garden fresh
i imagine gravestones, urns, mausoleums
decorated with crosses, stars of david,
vases, crescent moons, bronze baby booties
for a hundred thousand miles of drab,
debris-beleaguered blight
i see death behind guardrails,
along shoulders of interstate,
four- and two-lane urban and rural highway
no more need to plant or mow,
to send people in orange vests
to pluck plastic shopping bags,
sun-faded wreaths, and litter
from no-man’s land
