The Surveyors
To praise surveyors I was never timid,
I scan the verses of the Iliad,
And find Athena at a bound’ry limit
"Which men in olden times established had."
I quote from Zechariah 2 with pleasure:
"Behold that man with ropes, he stretches them;
I lifted up mine eyes and saw him measure
The length and breadth of old Jerusalem."
He was a learned and hieroglyphic writer
Who parceled out the flood plains of the Nile.
He measured Rome’s transcontinental iter,
His mille passus turned into the mile.
He rode with Coronado’s hapless dreamers,
To take the latitude at their command.
He ran a line to distant, orange streamers,
And sectionized a young and boundless land.
They are the vanguard of civilization,
And as professionals they stand apart.
I have no modest, skittish hesitation
To praise surveyors and their ancient art.