Grace Paley - House: Some Instructions

If you have a house

you must think about it all the time

as you reside in the house so

it must be a home in your mind

you must ask yourself (wherever you are)

have I closed the front door

and the back door is often forgotten

not against thieves necessarily

but the windohif it blows

either door openthen the heat

the heat youve carefully nurtured

with layers of dry hardwood

and a couple of opposing green

brought in to slow the fire

as well as the little pilot light

in the convenient gas b...