NAVY HOUSING
On Jones Street every house is painted white,
each door is white, and every yard adheres
to certain rules: the grass at crew cut height,
an apple blossom tree bent toward the sun,
a single bush trimmed squat and round and so
symmetrically it seems manmade. No one
can deviate from others in the row.
How easily I lose myself out here.
Even the dog can barely sniff his way
back from the park. Was it a left we took?
A right? Perhaps it’s safer just to stay
indoors than go off course again. Oh, look—
another flag, another garden gnome,
another sign proclaiming Home, Sweet Home.
On Jones Street every house is painted white,
each door is white, and every yard adheres
to certain rules: the grass at crew cut height,
an apple blossom tree bent toward the sun,
a single bush trimmed squat and round and so
symmetrically it seems manmade. No one
can deviate from others in the row.
How easily I lose myself out here.
Even the dog can barely sniff his way
back from the park. Was it a left we took?
A right? Perhaps it’s safer just to stay
indoors than go off course again. Oh, look—
another flag, another garden gnome,
another sign proclaiming Home, Sweet Home.
-Uses the sonnet form.
-Employs rhyme (abacdcdbefefgg).
-Listing of “certain rules,” found in lines 3-6.
-Lines 1-6 one sentence.
- “HOME, SWEET HOME” is interchangeable, in a sense, can be taken literally or ironically.
-Curious moment occurs in line 6 with, “[n]o one can deviate from others in the row.” Dual meaning or connection to above statement?
-Repetition on “another” three times in lines 13 and 14.
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