The Fence

The fence is a swaybacked nag now, though it never stood straight and true like a military unit on parade, and it serves no utilitarian purpose-- it keeps no one out it pens no one in-- precariously standing there on a lot now empty, a chaos of faded white-painted lumber imperceptibly swaying as if having been visited by a passing tornadic wind. But I remember well its birthing one lazy summer home from college, my father and I acting as midwives, neither of us carpenters, though he tried to pretend, as we pounded the earth with an ancient post hole digger, mixed and poured cement so our structure wouldn't pop out of the ground like a rogue LEGO toy after the posts were set and the panels joined to them, measured distance between post holes and the lengths of the 2 x 4s, scarcely an eighth of an inch or so off here and there, close enough, sawed and nailed them to the posts, then painted the whole wooden creation a bright white that might be detected by satellites in space. It had no more purpose then than it does now in its dotage except to mark the far boundary of our backyard, but it was our summer project, my father as foreman, me as his crew, life was good, and it still stands.

Bluejay

Veteran of old My Poetry Forum before its hiatus. Happy to be back.

More about me