On a gentle slope of close-trimmed grasses when the sun rays, slanting, dress with shadow the light folds of blanketing earth is most apparent the fractured faces of the underlying bedrock as it shelves. This stone is general in all places, deeper or closer as the eons have overlain it.
Here, the oldest homes have been set into it, their basements chiseled out with hammer and pick square and cool. We found a pie safe, some jury-rigged shelves, an oil furnace (top of its line for its time) and its tank. On this, in this,
the earth’s crust cleared of sand, loam, and dirt, dry by luck or past thoughtful work, our foundation, ceilinged with beams of halved, bark-on, straight fir: a fitting place to find the handiwork of old lives’ patching,
Benjamin Harnett is a poet, fiction writer, historian, and digital engineer. His poetry has appeared recently in Poet Lore, Saranac Review, ENTROPY, and the Evansville Review. He is the author of the novel THE HAPPY VALLEY and the short story collection GIGANTIC. He lives in Cherry Valley, NY with his wife Toni and their collection of eccentric pets. He works for The New York Times.
