City Garden

She moves from bed, trailing sheets to the floor,

showers, glosses pink lips and dresses.

Train people flow from the vomitarium.

Taxis jockey for suits.

Not like Saturday afternoon.

Lazy sun slides past the porch

where black boys without shirts

watch passing cars.

Legs embrace the comforter squeezing the memory of love.

She doesn't understand.

Full lips press the mirror-springs stream.

Rubber blades suction the curved windows.

Distorted in the bend.

Je suis la soeur

et lon amie.

I see myself, a phantom

in the dark distortion.

Quick breakfast: black coffee and bagel.

A missing dog and child taped to storefront window.

Hollow black eyes. Reward. Bichon Frise.

Wet spring. Trees drip with rain.

Magnolia, dogwood, oriental maple, with fingers

delicate as hers searching under sheets.

Troweling surprises the damp nape of the neck.

She understands the plight of the plundered people

paying taxes and eating grease.

She punches in appointments, and reshuffles files.

Call and answer calls.

Mud plucks steel.

Bulbs resurrect.

Ungloved fingers darken with loam.

A garter snake leaves his skin.

She will sheer hedges overgrown

and bind vines falling from arbors.