From A Safe Distance Poem by Ronald Baatz

FROM A SAFE DISTANCE

The red roses at the side of the motel
appear exhausted and to be losing color,
while orange tiger lilies are just beginning
to make themselves known. The landscape
is dominated by a large parking lot of
dreary gray stones. It's late Saturday evening.
I sit in the office with the air-conditioner on,
attempting to read Irish short stories but
mostly snoozing. Fifth year, it is, of my
living and working at this dingy motel.
If I could somehow stop counting the years
I'd be better off. A couple pulled in earlier
in a silver sports car, and when I showed them
a room they complained that it was too small.
They left. This response is common,
so it takes a long time to rent all the rooms,
even on a Saturday night. A cardinal
comes to the window, flutters in its reflection
and then is gone also. The sun is a dying fire
settling down in the woods. A Chinese woman,
young and slender, drinking a soda, walks
across the lawn. She's wearing a purple blouse
with a large green fish on the back of it. When
she gets to the parking lot she steps with
cautious bare feet onto the gray stones. If
I had the nerve I'd sweep her off her feet
and carry her across to where the grass resumes.
Perhaps then my life would change. But
I don't move. I just watch her out of one eye, like
a half-blind crow from a ridiculously safe distance.

Woodstock/1987