This town is too small for secrets The sidewalks are adorned with names and dates Of couples whose love dissolved twenty years ago While moss oozes out of the letters.
This town is too small for secrets Through windows at night The citizens play out their dollhouse lives And dysfunction is locked away in grandmother’s armoire.
This town is too small for secrets Where bars close at seven in the morning and open an hour later And the tenders are purveyors of free psychiatry Who put advice in bowls between stale peanuts And place them on the counter.
This town is too small for secrets Every hour the two churches compete for the loudest bells But the protestant one always wins And the Catholics having mass ignore its pleading voice But whisper politely in each other’s ears About the scandalous protestors out on Main.
This town is too small for secrets With its coffee shops littered with youth Who deny their wealth through coffee steam And discuss the state of countries they can’t place on a map And slowly leach out in to the frigid rain Back to new cars and million-dollar homes Where daddy pays the bills.
This town is too small for secrets The college students drink their scholarships in red plastic cups And scuttle towards their shared flats Collapse in to bed too tired to sleep Stare at the ceiling and wonder why they didn’t transfer Three semesters ago.
This town is too small for secrets With its gated communities of retirees Where the homes are manufactured And the walls papered with the smiling faces of clean-cut grandchildren And the rebellious ones packed away From the neighborhood gossip’s prying eyes.