IN PRAISE OF BUILDINGS WITH
AMBIGUOUS MAIN ENTRANCES

A Farewell to a Building
       
"The spaces we create shape us." 
-Sir Winston Churchill, on ordering the House of Commons
to be rebuilt just as it had been before being
destroyed during WWII.  


                                   
I love buildings without main
                       entrances, ones that ask you daily
     to risk all, where each threshold,
             promises adventure,
   and a simple mistake
         can mean whole moments of meandering
though who we are, time that's

never lost,
           where anxiety abides and
there is no right answer-ever,
                      where everything is complex,
confusing, a continuing collision
                         of choice and chance,

where most survive, save those                        
               consigned to lifetimes of
     wandering, searching
                for main offices they think
they seek. Instead,

let's praise a building with many
            entrances, one named Rogers,
   another Mitchell, or Marshall,
or Kirshner,

    that says, 'Come hither, and I will
             show you many different things,'

reminding that
         we need not get
    anywhere,
                  that the journey,
        as they say,

is all.

 

May 2000



All written material © Bill Schechter, 2016
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