When med students are learning
how to diagnose symptoms, they’re told
think horse, not zebra—the common, not the exotic. 
 
Which is good advice even if you’re not a doctor.
Like when your phone rings at 3:00 in the morning--
think wrong number, not who died? 
 
Or if your love is over an hour late 
for dinner and hasn’t called to explain, think 
gridlock, not head-on; dead zone, not dead. 
 
When the guy in the truck doesn’t slow down
much less stop when you step into the crosswalk, 
think distracted, not son-of-a-bitch. Recall the time
 
your mind was still at work, how shocked you were 
to see in your rear-view a woman in the crosswalk 
flipping you off with both hands.
 
And if you’re steaming in a mile long back-up
because protesters have blocked the bridge again, 
don’t think where are the damn cops 
 
when you need them, think how, 
when popping sounds wake you at night,
you think firecracker, not gun.
                        

Even the bluebird fades 
to gray as summer burns out.
 
The hawk’s fearless screech
sounds more like grief exhausting itself.
 
I spend the afternoon deadheading
daylilies until my fingers numb, my back 
 
and knees petrify. I remind myself that 
new blossoms will blaze the path tomorrow, 
 
and the stressed sugar maples I planted 
in spring are tipped with new growth.
 
I lift a handful of mulch to my nose, breathe 
the trees inside. And here comes the old couple, 
 
climbing the steep street. He’s frail and stooped 
but setting a steady pace, one arm reaching 
 
back, hand open as if waiting for a baton 
to be placed in his palm by the woman 
 
following him. She’s taller and stronger 
looking, her beacon-red hair piled so high 
 
I think at first it’s a hat. Arm outstretched, 
she slips her hand smoothly into his and seems 
 
to glide to his side. As they pass me they wave 
as if they are the liberators of Barnard Avenue. 
 
On the man’s red sweatshirt is a silkscreened face
that looks familiar, but I can’t place it until I see
 
the single word above the flowing black hair 
and dashing beret: Che. No last name needed.
 
I think the sweatshirt must be as old as the man
himself, throwback on top of throwback, relics 
 
of revolutionary fire. But then I realize it’s new,
unfaded, still a little stiff. And the look on his face 
 
isn’t wistfulness or irony, it’s devotion
to a future he won’t see any more than I will 
 
see the struggling maples grow tall enough to shade 
the house in summer. How can I not raise my mulch 
 
encrusted fist in salute, my flagging will surging 
like a relay runner reaching out to hand off the baton.