The low fence between our houses
Has stood for many years
The wear and tear of wood keeps time
Tells of bygone season
Protruding nails and striations
like the rings of a tree
Reveal age,
Previous owners built it
to mark the boundary.
There’s a gap in it now
A wood plank is missing.
Their little dog respects the space
He peers at us but
Will not venture to our side
at least not when we are looking.
I wouldn’t mind a visit
He has the sweetest face!
A rabbit or gopher, perhaps a lost cat
Has wandered in and out between our turfs
Unaware of fences, turfs or unspoken rules of neighbourliness.
I’ve seen the cat once,
The little children might have
Played hide and seek with ours.
They’re all grown up now,
Theirs and ours.
Birds of varying plumage
Have perched on the fence
Glanced quizzically into my kitchen window
Some have snow on their feathers
Harbingers of the changing seasons.
My favorite though, are the robins
How they puff out their red breasts
I love this one
He posed for a photograph
Let me capture the still life
I couldn’t paint.
We would make good neighbors
With or without the fence
We both have flowers and Apple trees
Two children each.
They have a dog, we have cats
The robins, squirrels and lost cats
Walk the fence with full ownership rights
We exchange barbequed chicken and other grilling
as the aromas waft over, between and under the fence
Frost said that there was ‘something that did not love a wall,’
We agree about fences,
There’s no talk of walls.
Some fences may make good neighbors
But some neighbors, like the robins
May straddle the fence
to be photographed.
Should the one missing plank become two
And the gap widens
We may not need to repair the fence.
Perhaps broken fences make better neighbours.
Madras Courier originally ran as a broadsheet with a poetry section. It was a time when readers felt comfortable sharing glimpses of their lives through verse. If you have a poem you’d like to submit, do email us at editor@madrascourier.com.
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