Lowell, Robert: For Sale

Poor sheepish plaything,

organized with prodigal animosity,

lived in just a year—

my Father’s cottage at Beverly Farms

was on the market the month he died.

Empty, open, intimate,

its town-house furniture

had an on tiptoe air

of waiting for the mover

on the heels of the undertaker.

Ready, afraid

of living alone till eighty,

Mother mooned in a window,

as if she had stayed on a train

one stop past her destination.