The Lawnmower's Lullaby (6/02/91)

A perfect Sunday morning
In my little slice of suburbia;
Trees gently sway in the soft breeze
Reaching out to touch
The faint white ripples above,
These looking like the sandy floor
Of an azure sea;
The wind chimes, excited by this scene
Sing dumb praise
In warm, resonant tones
Joined by jays and cardinals
Dispatching domestic chores;
From above,
The sun smiles obliviously on all.

From deep within my shady grove
A jarring whine of discontent
Rends the balmy air;
Mower and trimmer rise up
In snarling complicity
To wreak uniformity on the world.
New grass, dashing dandelions
And carefree clover,
All to the chopping block go
As the bristling machines
Lend a patina of easy sameness.

Like distant thunder
The mower's roar echoes
Above the streets of my town;
Above bored and restless neighbors
Lounging in a patch of sun
They've wrested from an old oak;
Above barking dogs and kids on bikes.
It whispers to us at night
As we sit around our tv's,
Calling softly, rattling windows
As it nibbles and gnaws
At the edges of our lives,
Paring and paring, leaving us less,
As trees desert the horizon
And stars abscond from the sky.

But beneath the surface,
Buried and tangled underground,
The roots of chaos run deep.
Cunning and stubbornly resistant
To our poisonous persuasions
They lurk with artful patience
Waiting for a chink
To burst through and leave our lives
Streaked with wild variegations.