Michael Lauchlan
The wind flicks papers, shingles, sand
—blades slashing all—as we detach
what little siding scrappers hadn’t
stripped long before Gloria
drank herself past waking. Her cats
and feral yard had pissed off
the kindest of us. We pry planks,
knock loose plaster and lath,
rip out doorframes and half the studs,
then drag all to a dumpster. Alongside
we stack branches from the dead ash.
The wind tears at our eyes,
screaming through opened walls
as a tall kid loops a rope over a beam.
Ragged neighbors fearing another shell,
its drunks, drugs, and inevitable flames,
we straighten our backs to squint,
seeing again our mix of garden plots
and sagging homes, feeling bloodflow
return to tired limbs. We line up,
cheer each other and pull the rope.