Fresco
Daydream past the stained glass
and steeple of a tiny Gothic church
to a field where buffalo graze,
and with a perspective shift, watch
clouds swirl in the sky.
Limp back uphill, beyond the red brick
of the Luxembourg-American historical
society, to locate the breakfast diner,
general store, a candy-red Coca-Cola machine
flickering outdoors. Nearby, the grain mill,
a welder’s, the butter-churner’s, park, a tavern.
By the park (and don’t forget the cemetery),
a seventeen-year-old boy with fresh stubble
and a backpack, not having given word to his family,
runs away to join the circus.