Progress Report

The bulldozer is slowly tugging

at our neighbors' gazebo

perched on the edge of Nan's Cove.

It is in the way.

No matter it sheltered from sun and mosquitoes

generations of watermen come ashore

with bushels of oysters, bluefish, crabs,

wives peeling apples, shelling peas, husking corn,

picnics of fritters and melons.

No matter the screens are torn,

door off one hinge. It still frames

sunrise and sunset and the moon.

Last spring a duck nested inside.

Swallows, wrens -

Immense yellow chains gird the octagonal flanks.

Enormous tires churn the lawn into mud.

You'd think such a flimsy structure would yield

like a box of stick matches,

roof shingles flying like cards played out.

Must be something about the foundations,

or the man who hammered the nails.

The gazebo shifts slightly

but stays in the way.