for David Lieberman
Every summer my neighbor
with a hard hat, heart, and hide
trundles out his hippo Harley
to go hissing out on a fat hot breeze
He doesn’t know it
(or does he?)
but that is how pain
wheels itself out
seasonal
It is real
It is recurrent
It is a reminder of the flaw
built into the machine to preserve perfection
If we could delve into the granular caves
of the asphalt his wheels wheeze on
we might see in the crepuscular cracks
a twisty little thing we call sorrow
stretching its centimal length
knowing it owns the world
Copyright © 2026 by Ralph Nazareth. Originally published in Poem-a-Day on May 16, 2026, by the Academy of American Poets.