In Tuscarora no one cares about
The ways in which you spend your nights and days.
The curtains stay untouched if someone shouts
You name in frank despair or drunken haze.

In Tuscarora rust and age conceal
Your tales of travels far away and great.
The license plates are gone and can’t reveal
The truth of how you came to your estate.

In Tuscarora saints and blasted souls
Inhabit every street, their virtues burned
Away. Disdainful of your lofty goals—
God’s grand indifference, that’s what they have learned.

Forget your needs for glory, love, and fame.
The hawk above the graveyard sings your name.

Summer, l994