The past was pointilliste and incidental -
Mr Stevens and sunsets, historical,
understood by landsats, critics, books from Lands & Survey
(initially) and motorways
(from his vehicle Willy urgently looks about,
feeling in this city of prominences
a glass jar). In his Progress Bunyan made Jerusalem
from glass and sunsets (this affects Willy)
distant and refracting, while the close Jerusalem
is a ghost settlement by a river, formed once
in a series of sonnets.
Willy too's being made, and made of silica:
he fixes cunningly the orbit of his footsteps,
recreates his journey among the heroes.
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