"Paolo Soleri's model city, Arcosanti,
ecologically conceived, is forging bells
to fund continued building by volunteers."
-- from a pamphlet explaining the project.
The sun stores coal from the desert's grate.
God's city looms, impaled on west-
ern sand, its double-bladed height a weight
against the sky, questing sun, pressed
to the mesa's floor in solar power, man's
other door from randomness and sloth
and global scarcity. Blueprint plans
become greenhouses sloping south.
Concrete heat-sink, mass of stone
waits breaking ground to build the cellar.
Bells are forged proclaiming need, their tone
a call to volunteers from near and far.
Chimneys channel sun-drenched air
that domes may rise and arching apses flare.
Previously published in the North Carolina Poetry Society's
"Award Winning Poems, 2000"
Used with the permission of the Poet.
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