So much depends upon
a red tricycle left crying in the rain
beside four grinning
garden gnomes.
So much depends upon
a red Radio Flyer wagon overflowing
with tulip bulbs and garden tools,
to which a bull-mastiff pup
has been chained all day.
So much depends upon
a red windmill, doing nothing
but lazily churning
the bright blue wind.
So much depends upon
a red, rusted-out pick-up truck stuck in the weeds
(bees in its belly, mice in the muffler,
a thick forest of sunflowers in its bed).
So much depends upon
an old, red barn, barely holding up its own weight
beneath the ever-shifting weight of the seasons.
So much depends upon
a red dirt road winding its way
through the hills and valleys of Oklahoma,
beneath a storm-grey sky.
So much depends upon
a pair of faded red Chuck Taylors
hanging from a power line,
(with a bird’s nest in the left).
So much depends upon
a red tail-light, barely visible on the road ahead
at five in the morning (don’t ask why)
on the way to Atchison, KS.
So much depends upon
a red-gold koi, circling
the stem-like leg of a Great Blue Heron
in the middle of a stream.
So much depends upon
the foot-tall, day-glo red liberty spikes
on top of the tiny punk rock girl
with the baby blue Doc Martins.
So much depends upon
childhood memories
of the giant, red tomatoes
your neighbor grew every summer
in soil sown with iron filings
from his machine shop.
So much depends upon
a Red Tailed Hawk floating
on a current of wind
in a sky the color of a sky blue workshirt
that’s been washed a hundred times.
So much depends upon
a red Japanese fighting kite,
wrecked and ruined in the rib-cage
of a lone Willow tree on a hill
in the middle of Missouri,
and no one, not a single soul around
to answer one simple
fucking
question …
