Hilltop Sonnet

Who visits this high meadow, lawn of the dead,

to see blue and bluer mountains that rise

out of the west; to converse with the crows,

great-winged turkey buzzards, black kites riding

thermals in seamless silence; to greet deer

here at twilight grazing near the wood’s edge;

to scare the huge groundhog that lives inside

the brick-walled graveyard: Who moves through this space?

A yellow dog leading a deaf old man

who likes to talk, a girl and her boyfriend

who sit atop her car’s roof murmuring

quietly, two off-leash labs ignoring

their shouting owner, a policeman who

parks up here to feel lonely, guarding the wind.