in a house
on top of strawberry hill
from the second story window
i look out upon the world below.

i’ve always loved the way
the streets skew away at all angles.
it reminds me
of other places i’ve been.

the houses layer up against themselves
like a children’s pop-up story,
but our skies are grey
and the streets are dirty.

for the first time i see how
that driveway across the street
is actually a little alley
that continues on between
those two far houses
facing king.

i never noticed how i can clearly see
the bell tower of covenant united
methodist - not catholic -
so tall and solid,
topped by its humble cross,
like it’s watching at the world with me.

it bothers me, why i could never see
something that holds so much meaning to me,
but then i observe how the leaves on that tree
have all gone away.
nothing now but bare winter boughs
like solid wooden eaves,
and i think,
perhaps,
winter is always more revealing.

i wonder if on that day
in that other city
there was another girl
staring from her house at night,
wondering about the things
she could and couldn’t see
while a baby boy was born
in a poor room down the street.

in her heart was a promise
like the one that’s kept in mine;
a king to rule a country,
a fire to rule the skies.