Sidewalks on Rock Street

It's not so much the sidewalk,
erupting as it is,
jagged plates of concrete
rocking under foot,
not the initials of lovers,
neither never old,
not the stamp of construction
(WORK GUARANTEED: 1908),
not even the oak's demesne,
roots reaching under mansions
while the limbs there blithely shade

(Time lapsed:
sidewalks coming up in waves that
break on generations), but

the results of our planting,
the beauty we create,
the destruction we perpetuate,
all so consequent in time
that we cannot imagine.


(Arkansas Magazine, Arkansas Democrat, January 19, 1986)