Saturday sweeping
with an old broom
counting the strokes
back and forth.
The dust sprays
up silver in the
February sun
and comes down gray.
Soft straw muzzlé
poking in and
bringing out
scraps of news,
little fingers
and signatures.
Everybody’s
had this room
one time or another
and never thought
to sweep. Outside
the snows stiffen,
the roofs loosen
their last teeth
into the streets.
Outside it’s
1952,
Detroit, unburned,
stumbles away
from my window
over the drained roofs
toward the river
to scald its useless
hands. Half
the men in this town
are crying in
the snow, their eyes
blackened like
Chinese soldiers.
at Dodge Main
and Wyandotte
Chemical; they
must go home
to watch the kids
scrub their brown
faces or grease
cartridges for
the show down.
If anyone knocks
on your door
he’ll be
oil flecked or
sea born, he’ll
be bringing word
from the people
of the ice drifts
or the great talking dogs
that saved the Jews.
Meanwhile our masters
will come on
television
to ask for our help.
Here, the radiator’s
working, stove says
Don’t touch,
and the radio’s crying,
I don’t get enough.
I’m my keeper,
the only thing
I’ve got,
sweeping out
my one-room life
while the sun’s
still up.