Don’t talk about the incident down the street.

And don’t go out at night.

When a pet doesn’t return, it means

they met with a pair of headlights.

Drivers won’t give you their condolences,

they won’t pause to see if it’s alright.

But the family in the green house

still tapes posters to traffic signs.

They built a brown fence

surrounding their oasis,

and from this spot on my porch,

I barely saw over the barricade.

Their father didn’t wear a belt

their Solo cups were filled with lemonade.

I saw the kids dig a hole in the dirt,

overheard their dreams of seeing

China, but they filled it with water

and called it their swimming pool.

Every time a stray cat appeared,

so did a bowl of food.

The pile of wood along the house

is a hide-away for the cats.

It’s a hide-away for the kids.

The five rooms were crowded with relatives.

Kids sat on the steps of the porch for dinner

balancing paper plates in their laps.

There weren’t enough seats surrounding the table.

Late at night, I could still hear their laughs.

There was a great view of the train tracks,

the kids would count the carts to see

who’ll be the first to spot the caboose.

A dozen times they’ve come knocking

because they accidentally threw

their lab’s ball over my fence and into my yard.

They made steppingstones of concrete, painted them rainbow

Placed them in a garden that never seemed to grow.

There’s one bar in town. Three green parks.

One red brick school, k through twelve.

My childhood is still there on Birch street.

I remember when I was a kid,

in the attic of my parents house.

Recently moved. Beds still not made.

I’d lay awake finding faces

In the faded yellow paint. The other day,

I drove home. The surplus of customers

painted the bar blue. Black spray paint

covered the rundown playground.

The bricks of the schoolhouse worn

to the same brown as the grass

in the parks. The walls of my old room

was painted grey, but I could still see yellow

faces through the cracks in the paint.