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This is called "To A Woman
Whose House Burned Down."

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And a lot of time
passes in the poem.

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At first, I imagine the
woman as a little girl,

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things in her life that
led up to where she

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was when her house burned down.

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And then there's a transition,
which hopefully you

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will be able to catch.

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"To A Woman Whose
House Burned Down."

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Somewhere, the sun
rose and people saw it.

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Children in other places
peered from the covers at dawn,

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and a soft orange light
filled the threatening corners

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of their dreams.

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But you woke to some blurred
voice of water or a man

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speaking to stone.

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You did what you were
told, you put on your coat,

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you smoked your fingers all
the way up Prospect Avenue,

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until the red bricks of school
gathered out of the fog,

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the fence gates closed, and
you put your little hand

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on your flat chest and
repeated the meaningless words.

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I pledge allegiance to
the fear of emptiness,

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and to the potential for
sorrow of my unformed breast,

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and to the Republic of my
loneliness, one small nation

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of warring desires, under
a flag of stars and blood

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and not enough money.

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And so on and so on.

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I don't know how it
was, but in no time

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you were home, having
dinner with your husband,

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and the kids in the house
turning to moss that he

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left you when he left.

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Then, it was bad wiring they
said, and you were standing

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a little ways back in
the woods, almost naked,

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with the flames reflected
in your still eyes,

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long before the sun
rose and people saw it.

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