Ever since Google published their map interface, people around the web have been using it to track all sorts of phenomena. There even seems to be a word for it — geotag: the process of adding geographical identification metadata to various media such as photographs, video, and websites (here’s the wikipedia entry). And there’s a blog called Google Maps Mania that attempts to keep track of them.
One such place is Poetry Atlas, which is “mapping the world with Poetry.” They believe “that everywhere has had a poem written about it at some time or other. Our aim is to augment reality by adding a poetic layer to every place.” On their map, I stumbled on this one:
Happiness
Carl Sandburg
I asked the professors who teach the meaning of life to tell me what is happiness.
And I went to famous executives who boss the work of thousands of men.
They all shook their heads and gave me a smile as though I was trying to fool with them
And then one Sunday afternoon I wandered out along the Desplaines river
And I saw a crowd of Hungarians under the trees with their women and children and a keg of beer and an accordion.
