Only sentient beings can be wretched: a ruined house
is not. Nor is its yard of thinning chickens,
enclosed by what looks like an agility course—
hollowed barrels, nestless lean-tos.
When one chicken starts running
they all do, distinct wing-shadows against the dust.
We understand ethics to depend on You.
And we understand it
to depend on us in Your absence, or in the event of
Your not existing.
Each of us casts shadows like every other object here.
Then, cleanly, the grass pales to the fence’s color,
the chickens aren’t stark.
Like a penny for anyone, the sun’s
white, perfectly, behind a white cloud:
we fail each other in ways we can see.
It is this sense of being watched
or it is You that calls us to responsibility.
