Whoever penned Ecclesiastes 3:1 must not
have had a mortgage and an older house;
must never have had to take care
of repairs. I hunt for Nextdoor
recommendations of plumbers, call around
for estimates and check prices on lumber
and siding. To everything there is
a season, it says: a time for this and a time
for that, for the orderly and equitable march
of days as well as their bloom and fade.
The stalk comes up after the seed, the flood
disappears into the plain. Should the cost
of fixing amount to another disaster?
O let this not be the time for the hot
water to go out just as the deck umbrella
snaps almost cleanly in half in a freak wind storm,
at the same time you find a snarling nest
of coons burrowed in the shed’s rotting wood
when you go to retrieve the ladder. Let the broken
fence palings keep from falling down into the service
road. Let the neighbors’ dogs poop regularly
somewhere other than the edge of the footpath
where you come and go. Look up at the sky
past the greenish cast on windows and walls
in need of power washing; at the flowers’ hot,
thirsty faces, sending out semaphores of entreaty.