Goshen.
For Granddad.
lone, lofty amongst the brush—
the first time I arrived, saw a lake,
long-dried by my second visit,
one shop, school, by the gator,
pallid, skeletal, empty as a shell;
white as an elephant in arridness.
he told me: this is your room—
I tried to imagine over crickets,
walking the yard in crow shadow,
bumpiest car path imaginable,
an omen perhaps for the rest:
the squatter, the case and the sell.
pharaoh gave the jews goshen;
the land, fertile and plentiful,
for generations, beneath the sun.