Gray Harbor, Maine

Melissa McCreedy

If you stop and ask directions

They’ll send you to the wrong place.

Natives, sensing that you’re passing through

On your way to the big houses on the coast,

Will scoff at your stupid trust

You should just know better.

Tired and fed up,

They have seen enough

Of the summer folk’s extravagance.

No signs announce the proud

Beginning or end.

The grass gets a little longer

Edges fade away

Houses dissolve into the wet blackness

Of hard wood forests.

Up ahead you will find

A convenience store in all its glory

With an overhang

Like the sagging eyes

Of an old sea captain

What this town was once famous for.

Max Reed with his dirty apron

And near-sided squint stands

Behind the glass tinted with grime

His hands like crooked pillars

Locked on his hips. At home

Above the mantelpiece

There’s an antique oil

Of his great-grandfather

In profile. He’s got on

A stiff blue coat with gold buttons

To protect him

From the winter’s salt air.

Max’s got his same

Yellow eyes.

Teenagers just old enough to drive

Pull up in their father’s car

From high school,

The year that the Bulldogs

Went undefeated and won

The state championship in football.

This ’72 Oldsmobile might be up on blocks

In some other place, loved and tinkered with

In the winter months, but here

The leather seats are taped together,

Paint chipped, and the twin glass packs

Rumble louder than they should.

There’s a hole torn out of the exhaust

And they like it better that way.

No one can hear over the noise

While they run in for a pack of Camels

And spit as they come out

Leaving the bells to chirp as the door

Seals behind them.

You may hold your breath

As you pass through,

Like children do when they pass

By a graveyard waiting

For the white house on the other side

The tan and gray shingled family homes

With their front porches

And bright flags full

Mailboxes guarded by the florescence

Of potted geraniums.

© 2001 by Melissa McCreedy

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