V

[V]

 

Versions vary, but fairly soon after the year Dot

Aspirationals built brick-by-brick quite a lot

A pyramid reflected in the sand red hot

V constructhist poem Disk would print on the spot.

Vain to the point of vainglory they got what they got

Attending to skyhigh values, but to their Maker, not.

Verbs vertebrated, nouns nonsensed, meanings went blot

As they witless split, not clear just what governed what.

 

Versions verify various likewise latter-day plots:

Aspires who built digital reincarnations chatting rot

Atmosphere memories missing the bon mot

Voluminous city and tower of invisible bot and jot.

Vain vastnesses in Confusion © software went shot,

A cloud of unknowing begot a cloud of forgot.

A reading of Genesis 11: 1-9, assisted by the letter V in Vitezslav Nezval’s alphabet book ‘Abeceda’. A copy of this book, published in Prague in 1926, is on display at the NGV at the moment. I have copied the relevant page for reference. Nezval is still in his Russian Constructivist period, though he doesn’t do Constructivism like people in Moscow. Nezval’s ‘hot’ and ‘spot’ inspired the brickwork of end-rhymes, while his A and V inspired the pattern of reflections on the left.