Walked around the old neighbourhood

where not much had changed except

the trees are mature and the toddlers

are now swaying teens who took me in

with an off expression, maybe wondered

if I was familiar in a good or worrying way?

When I waved a ‘hi’ they phone bowed,

memories wiped, sneered away at memes.
There’s a shot on the front page today,

of new Syrian refugees volunteering

on a Habitat for Humanity build, sporting

matching t-shirts in the new subdivision.

How tidy everything can be made to feel

if you’d just experience it as a cropped

photograph, with a warm lede, a general

sense that the world is kindly after all.
Ai Weiwei is on PBS again but I’m not sure

we listened the last time round. People,

I’m worried. Concerned. He’s going to

feel ignored. We’ve been at this forever.

Surely some patterns are emerging?

What say we change for a short while

and see how it goes? We can always

revert back if we don’t like how it feels.   
Walked around the old neighbourhood.

The dying woman’s house got flipped

and they ditched the ugly sixties shutters

thank god, and gave it a whole new

mid-century modern look. The old guy

that raked his leaves into the curb,

hosed down his driveway? He’s alive.

Waved eagerly. Asked me if I’d moved.