I went to daycare at the house next door
to my parents' in a small Vermont town.
The husband of the woman who watched us
always smoked his pipe while he mowed the lawn.

An adult now, when I smell tobacco
or fresh-cut grass, I think of quiet Joe,
taciturn in the midst of our antics: 
kids playing, the family dog barking

and his wife’s raised voice above all the rest
keeping everybody well in line,
a shout we heard from one end of the house

to the other - even across the yard 
if we happened to be outdoors, beyond
           the reach of her firm yet capable hands.