Lullaby 4

I’m starting to figure me out, starting
to whisper, lullaby, lullaby, lullaby,
on the steps of this house, where I played
jacks with girls of the long ponytail
and absurd name, like Tami or Treni.
Absurd always ends in i, which is the end
of lullaby, and the beginning of irises,
which bloom this year with a fierceness.

I’m starting to hate my shoes, toe worn through,
and their scruff on the concrete in that open
vowel way, while the sinking sun splits
the roofs of houses into geometrics, trails
the iron fence like a tin cup along the ribs
of a jail cell or monkey bar. I watch it dip
into treetops, graze my thumb over the concrete
where, even now, I swear I see the chalk.
Who really remembers how to play outside?