{"id":6990,"date":"2014-05-27T00:00:47","date_gmt":"2014-05-27T04:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gadflyonline.com\/home\/?p=6990"},"modified":"2014-06-11T14:55:56","modified_gmt":"2014-06-11T18:55:56","slug":"america-in-4013","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/america-in-4013\/","title":{"rendered":"America in 4013"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"America_4013\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Is that lava\u00a0or simply mud<\/b><\/p>\n

dripping from the cheeks<\/b><\/p>\n

of this old\u00a0woman\u00a0asking me\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

why\u00a0this library\u00a0has no books.\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

I ask her\u00a0where she’s been\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

for the last 2000 years.<\/b><\/p>\n

Under a rock? In some cave?\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

After all, the year is 4013<\/b><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

and now the only book extant \u00a0\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

is the Bible\u00a0and the only copy\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

of the Bible is\u00a0in Rome where\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

a few monks older than she is<\/b><\/p>\n

sit in catacombs all day\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

copying pages of it<\/b><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

onto yellow foolscap,\u00a0hoping\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

to create another Bible<\/b><\/p>\n

no one will read,\u00a0as was the case,\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

I’m told, when\u00a0dusty Bibles\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

were in almost every home<\/b><\/p>\n

and computers were a luxury.<\/b><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

But then I soften up\u00a0because\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

I can see\u00a0this woman was\u00a0born\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

without\u00a0a cell phone\u00a0in her ear.\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

I tell her if she wants to read\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

something wonderful online,<\/b><\/p>\n

as soon\u00a0as\u00a0a computer comes\u00a0free\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

I’ll call her even though she\u00a0has\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

no cell phone in\u00a0her ear.<\/b><\/p>\n

First, however, she must show\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

a number,\u00a0not a name,<\/b><\/p>\n

tattooed above her navel,<\/b><\/p>\n

the only form of\u00a0identification\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

accepted\u00a0in America in 4013.\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

Nominated for Best of the Net and Pushcart prizes, Donal Mahoney\u00a0has had poetry and fiction published in print and electronic publications in North America, Europe, Asia and Africa. Some of his earliest work can be found at\u00a0http:\/\/booksonblog12.blogspot.com\/<\/a>\u00a0<\/b>\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Is that lava or simply mud<\/p>\n

dripping from the cheeks<\/p>\n

of this old woman asking me <\/p>\n

why this library has no books. <\/p>\n

I ask her where she’s been <\/p>\n

for the last 2000 years.<\/p>\n

Under a rock? In some cave? <\/p>\n

After all, the year is 4013<\/p>\n

READ MORE.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":184,"featured_media":7149,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,219,199,217],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6990"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/184"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6990"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6990\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7201,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6990\/revisions\/7201"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7149"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6990"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6990"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gadflyonline.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6990"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}