Cluster Fig

Leaning out over

a lantana bush

abloom with polybags,

yellow and pink,

and a woman

gathering firewood

beside a sluggish gutter

while her twitchy goats

go looking for

a patch to graze on,

is the big cluster fig,

its giant’s foot, its

buttress roots, caught

in the rusted door

of the garden shed.

How it came to be there

no one knows.

Growing faster

than a beanstalk,

it’s become a high-rise

for birds. Pariah kites

and crows are heard

in its windows,

singing, screeching,

cawing, as if newly

in love, survivors of

the human disaster.