Just in case you don't know (and if it's not clear from the poem), Pandora is both a reference to the figure in Greek mythology who loosed all the evils upon the world by opening a box she was supposed to keep closed (leaving mankind with nothing left but hope) and also to the internet music service that plays music it thinks you'll like based on one song or artist you know you like.
Pandora’s Promise
Programmed playlists have their appeal –
the computer knows you like this,
predicts you’ll like that –
but I prefer the randomness
of regular radio, of finding
treasures among the trash.
“Yesterday” after “Sugar, Sugar”
or one Magic Flute
midst one too many
Nutcrackers.
And when I’m driving through static,
I cherish the rare clear station more
than the satellite signal
or love by logarithm.
Discovery is finding what
we never knew
we had lost.
(Life sometimes shuffle plays
music we had forgotten
we ever heard.)
Certainty is the enemy
of hope.
Pandora’s Promise
Programmed playlists have their appeal –
the computer knows you like this,
predicts you’ll like that –
but I prefer the randomness
of regular radio, of finding
treasures among the trash.
“Yesterday” after “Sugar, Sugar”
or one Magic Flute
midst one too many
Nutcrackers.
And when I’m driving through static,
I cherish the rare clear station more
than the satellite signal
or love by logarithm.
Discovery is finding what
we never knew
we had lost.
(Life sometimes shuffle plays
music we had forgotten
we ever heard.)
Certainty is the enemy
of hope.
