old gray

1
nothing
in my eccentricity
like
old gray stone

we have some fences around
here
a few are nice
while most are overgrown

there are some buildings
too
that stand

the association for me
is
with ghosts
of those who set
or
raised whichever and
the story
with the persons who are lost
maybe
in wars between the states
or
the war with England for first freedom

and
there’s what
to keep out
what
to keep in

speaking of first and
who
was here

and to extend the poet
classic and ironic meanings
it might have been
true and
could
still be that

good fences make good neighbors

so then
stone fences make stone
neighbors

2
texture
moss
what is fallen
what remains of what
has
fallen and what
keeps the form and
stands
for meaning

living metaphor for
boundary
for
protection
that could yet
be actual
for a building made with local
material
and that we mean to keep
and
to repair

and it’s the fences we have more of
in
all states and they are old
and some look pushed together while others
forgotten or
ignored
or someone owning
likes
the fallen texture
lopped shapes
even the worked through parts
made low
through
time
and unknown circumstances

they make good pictures
I believe
photographed
or
painted or fashioned with material
of one’s own

color
black and white
what
is decided
what’s at hand

or if we may
to
go there
smell
touch the long sides or
where they’re broken
touch
the nubs and
feel
the age
the stories

and I will make up stories of and
for
the ghosts there or
nearby

to have a story by my
home fire and
maybe an invitation for a hearing
by yours

3
the buildings and the fences
and
especially the fences
to drive by
as
the buildings are kept mostly at
a distance

but all
appreciable and made when
words
like
middlesex meant
something for a status and
a name

and the word we know
from
another poem

later Gettysburg close
about which
so
much has been said and sung and on
which
to borrow from a third so much depends

though
these are matters
upright or collapsed
like
dreams and
visions
we forget
to tell
the next ones on the way
the next ones
here

c l couch


Frost on fences, also Longfellow and William Carlos Williams

with another note by me
       an unintentional study
       even a reverie
       though
       I could have meant that
       briefly

photo by Richard R on Unsplash