Panorama After Foreclosure

After Federico García Lorca and Yehuda Amichai

I used to think it could be solved this way: 
like birds huddled above the U-Haul
along the branch rusting through 
its green roof. Skycreatures. Balloon 
on the house. My mother shrieks
in the garden. The snake 
nude against the light. Here: I give you 
my feathers—and here are all 
my clouds, the volcano’s intimacy—
but the birds aren’t ready
to be oxen again, the mountain matted
with Sisyphus’ sweat. Always the disdainful 
shelves of fruit, which is history, the engine
shivers. The dead stay dead.  

Copyright © 2024 by Carlie Hoffman. Used with the permission of the author.