from the edge between footpath
and roadpath, weeds rise
in a row of salutes. in one driveway
a car sinks to cement on flat tires
with the folded-up manner
of a cat gone compact on a windowsill.
I walk to the shop with no
shirt on for bread and a packet
of a half-dozen sausages,
a two litre bottle of coke. years after
I’d remember this morning
so vividly: the sun, 26-year-old
shoulders. sparrows in clusters
on phone lines which hang
loose as flags on a coast in a calm.