Red Suburb


All the watered lawns turned red,
swimming pools and miles
of blacktop and asphalt

roofs red too.
The sky is red

not only
as the sun
comes and goes,
but all day and all night, even
stars are red.


And you see things

like the red scent of lilac
or a red breeze

moving a red swan over the small red lake,
glittering arcs
of golf clubs on red fairways,

a red wedding gown floating
out of church in a cloud
of red organ hymns,

red envelopes shoved
through the red slot

with a clang, red piano
notes lurching uncertain
through the air,
red oak roots netting red cellars,

forsythia bursting red,
love-making vibrating
red out open windows, red

laughter,
red stains
on damask sheets,

a red school bus grinding
round the cul-de-sac,
three boys getting high
in the musty red
restroom at the interstate,

red flies swarming
red chocolate cake,
red milk seeping
from the sleeping
baby’s mouth,
a man shouting
above red radio blare,

red sweat studding
the gardener’s back, red noise

of mowers starting
and stopping,
red silence,
the peacock’s
long red call from the zoo,
a red canopy unfurling
automatically over a patio,
red shade,

girls in red jeans moving
through the red mall,

a couple knotted under red
willows at the parking-lot’s edge,

a car crashing red in the distance,
a nurse arriving home
in a cloud of red
cigarette smoke,
distant sirens,
red crickets warring

in the grass, red tears
in a man’s eyes
as he walks to his car,
red TV

screens lighting picture
windows, red whiskey
in a wine glass, a couple slow
dancing on a sea of red

linoleum,
a lone red shadow
behind that louvered window there.