The Sealant

The neighbor’s roof is being fixed in the heat,

and the smell of it—heavy, chemical, sweet—

has crawled through my screen and into my bed,

a thick, black static that fills up my head.

I saw a man drop a brush by the drive,

right on a patch where the weeds were alive.

Yellow dandelions, bright as a flare,

now weighted with sludge and gasping for air.

One head is a statue, matted and black,

a soft, golden thing that can't ever come back.

It’s hardening now in a permanent gloom,

while the scent of the furnace invades every room.