A Phone Is Ringing Somewhere — Thomas Wooten
The way the sun crept up behind us
was quite appalling. It made us think
J. Edgar Hoover was still alive. And
it just hung there for the longest time
on the horizon waiting for our next
move. The sound of birds in the trees
was distressing because we didn’t
have any trees in our neighborhood.
They had all been cut down to make
way for the new neighbors. We can
see them breathe between sighs,
their halos floating heavenward.
Life on this day was being recorded
by everyone a little differently. Mother
was exercising her prerogative to forget
who she was. Father’s morning shave
came very close to the end of his life
but he’d never looked at Mother
with more longing. And little June.
She was eating her cereal in the tree
house that sat on a stump, watching
the new neighbors watch TV as night
fell somewhere. And then it was falling
here, right where rumor had it falling.