Ancient Albany
 

It’s the tender side of Albany summer
its panels of late yellow light
streaking two-family aluminum sided two storied homes
Temporarily sheltering divorced male nurses
And soloed union men who do plumbing
And who park alternate days
Their white company pick-ups against the curb

So temporary yet the tenderness can be any place
any time, this smell of privets in bloom,
This earth beneath the earth beneath the grass,
These cracked sidewalks’ rivulets
Are etchings of human history,
Delicate decaying concrete, tracings of
Cave drawings and God’s earliest outlines.