Landscape of the Olfactory

Ahhh, that smell--
That complex and swirling mixture,
Which clings to my nose-hairs, and
Burrows into my palate,
Only to seep out later,
And reassert itself,
Rude bully, shouldering by whatever
I was doing, to knock me
Backwards into that place again,

It comes to my nose
in varying proportions of
Diesel smoke, rain on grime-spattered pavement,
Ordure, sweat-varnished clothing,
Earthworm, Frying meat, wet newsprint,
Decaying animal carcass, burnt brake lining,
Vegetable oil cooked to motor oil, Urine,
Spices named and unnameable,
Cigarette ash, and the ozone belch of a
Subway tunnel.

It is death, and life, and sex and waste,
Food and excretion, exertion, enterprise,
Fear, failure and pain,
An ice-pick stab through a moment
In the archeology of the present.
It is the City.
It is a landscape of the Olfactory,
Knowable only to dogs, or to the blind.

It is hills and valleys, paths and dells of scent,
Secret places where gatherings happen
Again and again, and move apart on separate paths.
It is rough, dense patches,
Where one must go slowly, to sort out the trails,
And where confusion is the only possible emotion.
It is pristine meadows of sunlit odor, untrammeled,
Untouched, and seemingly without end,
Causing joy without explanation,
And without need of any.
It is disgust, and sadness, and pain of what was,
Or could have been.