It promises quiet here. A green Plymouth
has been a long time sitting across the street.
The lady in 2428 limps with a cane
and west of me fields open all the way
to the mountains, all the way I imagine
to the open sea. A three colored dog
doesn’t bark, and between 2428
and 24 I see blocks away a chicken coop
in disrepair, what in the distance seems
moss on the roof and for certain
the windows out, for terribly certain
no chickens, and for beautifully sure
a gray pile of lumber in a vacant lot.
My first morning is cloudy. A rumpled
dirty sheet of clouds is crawling northeast,
not threatening rain, but obscuring
the Rattlesnake range. In 2430
a woman is moving, muted to ghost behind
dotted swiss curtains. She drives
a pale green Falcon. This neighborhood
seems a place where lives, like cars, go on
a long time. It has few children.
I’m somewhat torn. On one hand, I believe
on one should own land. You can’t respect
what you own. Better we think of spirits
as owning the land, and use it wisely, giving
back at least as much as we take, repaying
land with Indian rituals of thanks.
And I think when we buy, just the crude fact
of money alone means we really pay out
some part of self we should have retained.
On the other hand, at least fifty buntings
are nervously pecking my lawn.