Our first adult house was built in ’41
and we lived in it for 23 years.
We know little of the genealogy and stories
of the previous occupants of that address.
That imaginary of the past didn’t seem to peak our interest,
despite the occasional plastic action figure or
miscellaneous mystery metal fragment buried in the backyard
or in the dirt cellar where the furnace lived.
Digging into that kind of bygone times
is not where our obsessive excavations take place.
Perhaps, it was the nazi sticker found on our side walkway,
or the pack of aggressive pit bulls
that trampled our garden
or the large several dumpster size garbage heap
with hawks perched on the fence
seeking out rats in our other neighbor’s yard
that stilled whatever curiosity
we may have had into the history of that place.