Before This Day

Dad is painting windowframes

At the top of the house

Mom steadies the ladder

With a slippered foot

My sister cannot bring herself

To pour poison on the ants

Working their way frantically

Up the inside corners of this soon-to-be a home

I run through grass that is grown high above my head

I am a million miles away

I have no memories

I have no memories before this day

Cup of tea for the plumber

Cup of coffee for the builder

Brother sister, father mother

Each in love with one another

Somewhere, a whistling kettle

I meet the world and the world is a stinging nettle

I run through grass that is grown high above my head

I am a million miles away

I have no memories

I have no memories before this day

Mortar bees living in the bricks

There may or may not be a snake in the compost heap

And the neighbor’s cat is white and quite insane

Collarless, aggressive, and unnamed

And I have never seen so many sheep!

I’ve never seen so many cows!

I was a born to a family a little while ago

I was born to myself just now

I run through grass that is grown high above my head

I am a million miles away

I have no memories

I have no memories before this day

Before this day