Posts Tagged ‘S’

S

Summer

Summer Street

It was a city street,
Comfortably middle-aged without being rundown.
Not wealthy enough to have brick houses
But solid horizontal siding
Overlapped against Winter’s strength.
No one ever got a sliver from them.
Well cared for houses are well-behaved
And their edges are rounded with biennial layers
Of dignified color, with white trim.
Most were narrowed, single-familied, two-storied
Standing in mirrored pairs, flanking double driveways,
Pale grey, white, or the more daring beige.
There were a few older houses,
And a number of two-family flats
With long verandas both upstairs and down.
Back yards had just room enough for the clotheslines,
And, beyond the concrete, a row of Hollyhocks
Against the wall that hid the alley.
Front yards were only tiny squares of lawn
And at the curb, a strip too narrow for trees,
Sometimes both were cemented over.
(more…)