Enseignez-Nous D'enumerer Nos Jours. (Translation) . Poem by Michael Walker

See Poem Hunter/ Rita Dove/poems/ 23/31.
The title 'Teach us to Number Our Days' is quoted from Psalm 90: 12, 'Teach us to number our days right'.Holy Bible. Confirmation Edition, p.599. The poem is quite obscure in meaning, compared to most of her other poems. It starts in a run-down city neighbourhood, where there are elaborate funeral parlours, and police wearing pistols on their thighs. It hints at the danger of death.
It is a poor neighbourhood with 'low-rent balconies stacked to the sky'. There are many TV aerials and a boy looks at the moon and has a dream. Probably, he dreams of escaping this neighbourhood one day for better things. His aspirations are expressed in the image of a blue bean sprouting and growing.
The sky is knotting like a blue tie, perhaps foiling the boy's dreams. It is the patroller, who is not interested in the boy's life, who holds the information ie. 'all the beans'. It implies that the cops with pistols hold all the power in these streets.