Setting the Scene

Either due to an underdeveloped imagination,
or psychological sublimination,
the scenes of stories take place
in the bedrooms and backyards,
libraries and landscapes of my life.

For example, when Elizabeth
went to entreat upon her father
not to marry Mr. Collins,
she dashed into my grandmother's study,
Mr. Bennet sitting in the rocker by the window.

When Gale was whipped to near death,
Haymitch laid him down in the living room
of my aunt's house--Prim running in from the kitchen,
a fireplace replacing the television.

Anne's house of dreams was not, as you might think,
in a fishing village in Canada, but quite
inexplicably, in Wisconsin--
the Revel's house, at the end of the cul-de-sac.

I watched with Scout as Atticus shot that rabid dog
that had bumbled down Jackson Street
while Mrs. Whatsit and Mrs. Who showed up
in my godmother's backyard, a few blocks away.

And I wonder what your psychologist would say,
to a couple red-haired twins in a flying car
breaking the bars off of my own bedroom window, 
grabbing Hedwig's cage (next to my piano),
and flying above Ardmore into the moonlight?

[draft]