Suburban Outpost
1 Minute Read Time
A neighbor’s flag flapping, its weathered cloth
stretched on a gust, a pair of crows take flight
around an eastern pine, their game of tag
and calls like laughter, a tiny riot
whenever the bluster dies down. Siren
Doppler-effecting down the block, toddler
tantrum settling to a nap, metal
on metal of fabric gone slack—stars draped
across stars, stripes crossing themselves, measures
overlapped as illegible song, din
of easy meaning inflicted on dye
and thread. Again the wind picks up, pilfers
every voice, the flag unfolded, whipping
itself ragged as if to lash the sky’s
bare back, and I convince myself I find
a cycle in the unremarkable
happening of nothing, nothing happening
the fact of each day in such an empire:
half the streets named for animals and trees,
and half for the men who cut it all down
to spread their seed and gathered up the glut.
Read more from Issue 17.2.
