At dusk

There’s a black cloud over the hill.
There’s a black cloud over the school.

The grass shoves the shed to the fence
at property’s edge. Rumor says under the shed

there’s a copperhead or two. Rightly, crawl space
is what these burnished snakes are banished to,

but the nettled grass, the chain link fence
fail to bar them from the dappled yard.

There are grackles under the trees.
Under the trees at dusk there are grackles

that peck and crack pecans near the hedge.
A squirrel skitters and scats up a scaly bole

in fear of these dark birds with squatters’ rights,
while the sky . . . ? It folds and is quietly stored away.