New cities

            are built on the ashes of the old.

The ruins

            caged away

                        like a wild animal

                        like they could get out.

Layers of broken civilizations

            those most famous unburied and put on display-

Look but don’t touch.

(There were eleven Troys

            the seventh was the most famous

            the eighth brushed away

                        and forgotten.)

Beliefs of the past

            are actions of the present

                        and legends of the future.

We mock the uncivilized-

            they are uneducated, savage-

                        but we never learn.

(We can’t believe that segregation was a real thing

            because it was so long ago

            it seems so irrational

            yet we continue to hate without reason today.)

(We cage our cities and our past

            so we are not responsible

                        for the lessons they teach.)