I'm using Whole Foods as a metaphor I guess in a Nietzschean way, above all. I already know this is a failure. It's over. The notions have changed. This is yet another case of failure. These struggles are still going on. They will go on. But that stuff needs to be theorized. The time stuff. There are lots of models out there. Should I be trying to theorize the temporal? I haven't done a whole lot of that. It's very helpful to hear that there's a place. Maybe that's a way to get some purchase. I didn't come away from this persuaded that this isn't the same old story. I couldn't get a sense of the texture. I don't feel a need to elaborate on power. Maybe it doesn't work. What I'm trying to show is that the alternative scale has the potential to emerge. These large parts happen to be coming together. Meanings of buildings. Affects. These are available to be harnessed. The way in which Whole Foods has opened any kind of critical space — I didn't actually see it happen. I understand the theoretical interest. It also might be true. They may have failed. Why the desire. Is that all they are? Can things have multiple meanings? What role does theorizing them play? Corporations are powerful. This is probably a failure on my part. They are powerful. A large part of the piece was to explain their power. They're powerful and that's the way I read it. That's how I read the creation of Whole Foods. An alternate site could be as powerful, could coexist. Bring in the history, how quickly the city came into being. Things can change extremely quickly. I'm definitely not making a causal point about Whole Foods and the emergence of radical politics. Maybe it's not the best example. But look, in the parking lot, in the paper bag: snow falling on oranges. And in the past these oranges connected at the stem, I didn't see it in person, to green trees, and through the trees night birds fell noiselessly.

Glass: A Journal of Poetry is published monthly by Glass Poetry Press.
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