Walking
the boy saw:
The moon in a slot of sky
between the roofs of two houses.
Metal cobbles like shiny
backs of beetles – pieces of armor in a
book.
A yellow leaf shaped like
a heart or the tip of a spear flew
up against the steel-gray sky.
A house that showed a corner
of shattered masonry;
thin mud colored bricks.
The hands held feeling like
the orange light of a candle in a narrow
room.
On the white walls of a house
black lines.
Behind the calcimined walls
pictures of fish swallowing
their tails.
The blank faces of the houses and the
cylindrical trees.
This was 1937 or 1938.
*homeland