Shotgun House

All the time I lived in that house
the kitchen table never did listen
to the knife blade. I let my watch fall
into the same glass bowl every day,
but it never helped.

We tried not to break the good dishes,
and yet we did, again and again,
while Mother was pickling okra
or stringing beef along a wire in the yard.

I got down into the hills
to get away from it.
I lived in the horizon.
I counted to ten.
In the silence I could hear
the knife blade on the table.

The crawfish boil always left us salty,
...