Stranger

The truck coughs    
drops below the fog and woodsmoke ceiling    
that the weak sun has just begun to cut.    
I’ve known him enough to start to see    
his clothes more seem a costume    
conversations turn to questions    
his excavating mind engrossed  
in the business of strangers,    
picturing the smoking fires    
behind each plywood or tarpaulin wind break    
secret lives    
bottles and packages    
files and firearms.    
There are ideas here    
that he hates    
eccentricities of spare time    
hidden in houses among my warm neighbors    
and all of their sleeping children.