Finer Things

I live in the country for medical reasons.
Not for work. Not for family or education.

Not for culture or fine arts. I am here for fresh air
and freedom. I never knew I would live in a place

so remote. Without trash pick-up or a daily
newspaper. I grew up with oriental rugs, fine china,

box seats at the concert hall, piano lessons, Cecchetti
ballet. In my teens I attended cotillion. Learned how to

take a man’s arm, dance, make polite conversation.
You would never know it now, as I weed the gravel drive.

Wrangle the pick-up over rocks and ruts. Struggle to keep
the forest back. As we go through tires and firewood

in a life I never planned. But when I stand in the dark,
watch the moon come over the ridge and light up our cove,

the silence is as grand as any Steinway, the air silky
as the finest damask.