Forty years ago this night (a whir now
with the cicadas’ never-dying thrum)
inside the rambling family beach house,
you slept, the stone sleep of an eight-year old,
until the sirens wrenched the house awake.                              

Years ago, trains freighted cattle in cars
headed to the Chicago slaughter yards,
but your Uncle Charles, a meat-packing heir
and bachelor, who owned this once-estate,
stabled his Jersey cows behind blue-tinted

glass, providing milk for his weekend guests. 
Our rented house, built on the site of grass
tennis courts, remains flanked by aging sycamore,
hemlock.  A map displays the summer gardens,
Rabbitry and Ornamental Bird Pond. 

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