going home

you do go home
again.
over the bridge.
down
the highway,
a right, then a quick
left
at the light
by the dry cleaners,
Mead's liquor
store,
the drive thru
still with six cars
in line
for a bagged bottle
or two,
then behind the drug
store
where you played stick
ball,
that isn't a drug
store anymore,
but empty
and charred from a
fire.
then there it is,
the house you grew up in.
309 Dorchester St.,
the middle house
of three. rough bricked,
four
casement windows,
two trashcans
set between the bushes,
just like you
remembered it to be
fifty years
ago. the concrete
porch baking
in the summer sun.