The Answer Man

1.
The WOR Answer Man, who knew
everything -- did the Romans eat ice cream,
how tall was Jesus Christ, why do cows moo --
got stumped by this one: Do birds dream?

America and I would tune him in
on Sunday nights to hear the seer defeat
that week’s mailed-in mindbenders, and win
my lifelong inclination to compete.

	When the mountaintop White Throated Sparrow peeps,
	its little brain lights up, and an ECG
	outputs a sketch, and the same sketch when it  sleeps,
	dreaming its D didi D didda D (Chat GPT)

He had a research staff and a book-crammed suite
near the library on 42nd Street.


2.
I liked to dream that some day I would be,
well, the smartest homo sapiens ever.
Not working too hard I’d mutate to maturity,
a human Monarch butterfly, so clever.

(like mother-love, this this self-infatuation,
so warm, so undemandingly ambitious.)
The Answer Man gave solace to nation
while I would raise my hand a lot in English.

Chat suggests this Fermi estimate:
“830 billion loosely packed
bison to fill the Grand Canyon.” That
being another nut the A-Man never cracked.

Likewise, the sparrow’s dactyl D dida D dida D
remains a total mystery to me.

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