East Region

Bone white, square, there a neat façade

With tiny windows all about, an open door that’s odd.

Closer, the image falls apart, the casings off-center, the edges worn.

Paint chips – no, cloud shards – scattered and torn;

Underpainted faces disturb cracked grey-blue plaster.

Is it inside or out? Delight, or disaster?

On the wall, nine pictures of who knows what all,

Some old folks in mounts, some bigger, some small.

There’s a bird on a perch, a potted flower, a sign

Asking God to bless this happy indulgent design.

Left, a man cut out of drywall shows up,

Black mustache smile upturned like a cup.

A red shirt spurts out of his grey pin-stripe suit;

On his head a grey derby that matches to boot.

To steady his form, a plain black cane.

(Or a leash pulled taught? A puppy hiding below the frame?)

A tea set on a table, too tiny for two, a pot underneath,

Clay pot full of nothing resides far left, umbrellas in a yellow sheath.

A vase, a ball atop a tilted wall, another on a chair,

Strange things scattered so here and so there.

“Interest in this property? There is a price to pay.

Look quick, don’t blink, it is going away.”

The thin man speaks without sound.

Panels unfold, a flipbook of schemes,

Red check, dusty red, beige clapboard, then greens

Hit the brick wall, scant scrims on the seams,

Disjointed, anointed by the artist’s Wilde broom

Making order of mayhem, but never a room.

On a table by the red wall an upright stick phone

Has no one to answer when nobody’s home,

Not six men in topcoats and hats who flee

Stage right through the flats of Act Number Three.

“It’s open concept season, the trendiest kind,

But no isle of marble, or ensuite you’ll find.

No snug cubbies here, no pantry, no spa,

No two-car garage, no place for your ma.”

There are no directions to the neighborhood in question,

Walls are in motion, stories half-written escape to the roof.

In is out and in unbalance hangs “Open for Deception”

Warning comet tales mixed magic amid planets aloof.

“Have you made up your mind? An offer is pending.

Be mindful of time, when the deal will be ending,”

The unreal estate man says.

We did not know when the architect fell off his chair

All the drawings were broken, nothing was as it seems

It should be, with jumbled pieces lying there,

We moved on, forever passersby the house of our dreams.