Neighborly Love
/Chase Harker
I know that my neighbor hates me
But she would never admit it—
It’s the way she compliments
My flowerbeds that I know it,
The way she applauds my blooms
Every spring, the way she hums
Through my barberry’s thorns
When I am reading upon my back deck
Or working on some new assignment.
I have picked up her game, though,
Over the past couple of years—
Her plastic smile, her hyena laugh,
Her school girl eyes, her theatricality.
I have recently become one of her kind
And joined the neighborhood HOA.
Now, in the fall, before she gets a chance,
I rake my yard free of leaves and debris,
Weed all the beds, clear the gutters clean,
And wake up an hour earlier than her
Every Sunday in order to wash the dust
Of the previous week off of my truck.
Sometimes she comes out as I am drying
Spots off my hood or shining my tires;
Sometimes I startle her with a good morning
Before her old eyes can adjust to the sun;
Sometimes she holds her left hand above
Her heart and replies with a fake likewise
Then remarks how I am looking sharp today.
I know that my neighbor hates me—
I hate that wry, cackling bitch too.
Bio:
Chase Harker is a poet from New Bern, North Carolina. He is currently an MFA student at the University of North Carolina Wilmington.
