The poet has sold his old home

For cash, which is strange,

Both for the thing lost and the thing gained.

The centennial chests and disassembled

Beds are arranged in the grass.

The house has been strangely turned inside out.

The land has also been sold,

And now smacks of privilege.

It is jealous of control, I know it is jealous,

Though they keep saying that menace is human,

And I keep saying that angels can murder,

And can be appointed to murder,

And when they take bodies to act

They protect their transparence

In hardness: barks and stones.

“You even come to love granite and blight,”

I imagine his apology

To the broker.

The poet is an obedient man.

He is not afraid of telephones

And refrigerators,

Or of driving to Bear Mountain

In a Volkswagen. But he doesn’t divide

Angels from stones.

So he may be safe,

Though he has driven them out of his home.