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Most recently, Sandra Kolankiewicz’s poems have appeared in New World Writing, Prole Literary Review, Southword Editions, and New Welsh Review.  Her most recent chapbook, Even the Cracks, is available from Finishing Line Press.

Something To Be Done

Sandra Kolankiewicz

Now I see your back gate swinging,

            recycling piling up by the side door,

pale lights flickering behind the blinds at all hours,

            children absent from the gang playing at the corner,

instead walking straight from school past my

            house to yours and disappearing behind

the click of a locked front door.  The dog is gone,

            your cat on my front porch, crying to be fed. 

Your mother pulled out of your driveway with a

            twisted red face. We have all stopped knocking,

don’t call, have ceased inviting you and yours to

            cook outs since the day you sat at a picnic table

during the block party and picked your skin,

            bummed cigarettes though no one smokes,

your daughter’s eyes wary, judging the distance

            between her and the next person waiting for a

hot dog, yours the house on the block we’re all

            aware of, waiting for consequences to catch up,

something to be done, for the other shoe to fall.

— Sandra Kolankiewicz

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