The couple next-door is fighting again,
tho there are fewer banishments these days.
there’s always the same number of neighbors
in the morning. every day he starts his truck
near 4am for work, lets it idle and sputter
fifteen minutes. every morning, she smokes.
they always split a bowl later, after dinner. both
yell at the dog, but his voice is harsher. it is
known even a fierce love cannot quiet cruelty.
it’s almost midnight, so the single man
across the way is working his table saw.
even tho he began in spring, he never runs
out of 2x4s or sheets of particle board. surely
his little house is a relic destined for demolition,
as the money will soon find this neighborhood,
too. could be he’s fashioning a hidden shelter
in anticipation of gentrification. crisis. chaos.
a winner’s take. all along the block, the blade’s
shrieks shred shared walls. but, by 3am,
most won’t hear the track of the diesel freight
as it hauls crushed cars or plastic debris, sometimes
even toxic materials from back east; all destined
to discover the ocean and lie there. perhaps
the same yellow engine will return in a week
its rumble and horn heralding the passage
of lumber, wheat, or sweet wine in the night,
when it seems most precious things are stolen.
and, by 3am, she will likely have forgiven him,
or come home, at least, and all the single men
will have fallen silent. on monday the houses
down the west end will be demolished. more
than a few pre-date the city’s modern bloom,
now safe, the council says, for no one. some
will say it’s a pity. others will later suggest the gap
makes for an excellent view of the city’s center,
home to all the new needles, filled to bursting
with prospects, bordered by neon, sanctuaries
of the quick buck; dazzling from a park bench.
Published in Cider Press Review, Volume 24, Issue 6.
G. J. Nelson is a queer poet & writer birthed & corrupted in the American high desert who now operates from the Pacific Northwest. A graduate of the MFA program in creative writing at the University of Nevada, Reno, their work has most recently appeared in publications such as Waxwing, Poet Lore, Ninth Letter, Frontier Poetry, Salamander, december magazine, Salt Hill, & Pidgeonholes, and has received nominations for Best of the Net and Pushcart prizes. They currently teach writing at Centralia College.
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