6136. OF A DISPLACED MAGNITUDE

OF A DISPLACED 

MAGNITUDE

Lincoln's body came to New York on a ferry

which crossed from Pavonia  -  we now know

that as Jersey City. It had gotten to there by

rail  -  then, in NYC, the huge procession followed,

down Broadway, to somewhere lay in state. there's

a famous window shot of a young Theodore Roosevelt's

view of the funeral cortege, making its way down the street,

'round the corner from his grandfather's house. From a

window they watched, maybe three or four floors up.

-

Just some touching moment, the sort that cracks crackers

or breaks breakers, or beams beamers  -  or however you'd

want that put. Young Theodore remembered, doggerel like

that all the same. He too once took a bullet, yet kept on

delivering some doggedly stern speech.

-

How these things all coalesce, I'm never sure. The grand

mathematics of fate  -  which has missed by a million

miles ago  -  just goes on. Sums and equations we know

nothing about. All of a displaced magnitude themselves.