after Dorianne Laux

We sit around the fire pit, a blue-and-white
cooler housing a small bag of chipped ice,
a makeshift igloo by my side. We’re tired
like the gray clouds that float over our heads.

Early summer grass is beginning to brown
in patches the size of home plate. The wrens
warn us to stay away from their territory
with dive-bombs of gray-and-brown feathers.

In a month it will be too hot to sit outside
with happy hour drinks and cheese from three
countries. We understand the word savor and
chew on it with intense deliberation. I want

more bees this year. I point to my whiskey
barrel full of baby zinnias. They’re for Walter
who died three weeks ago. He loved their
resistance and wishes to come back as one.

The man next door pulls in from work. He
looks our way and casts a wave with his right
arm. He’ll be 40 next month, says he feels
old like he might not make another year.

A cardinal lands on the picnic table. He has 
a wiggling worm in his mouth and stands
motionless for half a minute, then flies
away as quickly as he landed. The

sound of hammers and band-saws comes
to a halt in the new neighborhood across 
the road. We need to have a funeral for
the once-perfect ridge that’s been decimated

beyond recognition. The developer calls it 
progress. I call on Sandi to pour me another
pre-mixed martini. The olives are stuck in the jar 
from overcrowding. I feel stuck inside the house

in winter. Spring offers hope and water.
The girl next door takes her old dog on a walk.
She peers through the cracks in the lower pine
branches wondering why we’re having a party

without her. Country & western music peels
in the distance. Crows are having a convention
in the tree tops that divide the lots. They want
to learn new faces to keep their memories sharp.

I feel like a part of something, but it won’t
last forever. Nothing does. I need permanence
and a bowl of rocky road ice cream. But first
I need to finish my martini and send friends home.