The World

        What are we doing 

in the world?

        In the world,

where the children

        are playing 

world.

        Where they drive

their little toy cars

        and trucks up

and down 

        the steep 

imaginary 

        roads

of the mind—

        maneuvering 

around

        the oncoming 

traffic that barrels 

        down around 

endless hairpin 

        turns—

What are we doing 

        in the world? 

Where our neighbor’s 

        girls operate 

on their dolls—

        Having laid them out

in the late

        sideways light 

of Spring

        on a tousled,

pink quilt 

        on the grass,

they amputate 

        a leg

off of one,

        and with a blue marker

draw an X

        on the heart 

of another 

         acutely 

ill doll—

        What in the world 

are we doing?

        In the world,

where the children

        are playing 

world.