Beneath my sleek suburban yard
The black soil cracks in dry years.

The vacant lot behind the mall erupts
In bunchgrass clumps and bindweed.

In Spring I look for line storms;
Autumn jumps from hot to snow.

Sketchy skeins of ducks and geese
Honk south across the rooftops in November.

And somewhere in my city mind
I smile to know

That if I drove the highway fifty miles