Where Great Clouds Go Sailing

“I, poor hermit, what do I know of these scientific questions which are still so perplexing?”

I am stunned by the magnitude

Of neighborhoods. Both driving through

The tangled nests of cul-de-sacs

And zooming on digital maps,

I can’t believe how many lives

Live out in spilled, honey-less hives

Of stringy, headless villages.

I know we’re legion, but still. This . . .

I’m not awed by demographics.

Large numbers are only numbers.

Our neighborhoods are compounding 

And confounding, not countable.

Drive subdivisions in the dark,

Nearly anonymous exurbs,

Or rural bedroom communities

Where a few shadows walk their dogs.

At dawn, people get on with lives 

That blew them into these corners.

Children line up for the school bus.

Today might be garbage pickup.

Every neighborhood is unique.

Entire worlds curl up in them.

They’re everywhere, like pottery

Shards where middens were abandoned.

Fall into any neighborhood

And land on a random planet

Where ghosts pile up in drifts against

Hearts beating hard against panic.