The Mans Yard You Should Not Hit Your Ball

From the minute I read the title of today's poem, I knew I was going to enjoy it. I chose this poem because the title reminded me of a very familiar childhood movie, The Sandlot; because of this I thought I could interpret it the best out of all of them. This poem is unique in that the title is actually the first two lines of the poem. Right from the start the title says a lot. The title is very direct in the way it leads into the poem. Readers don’t have to guess what this poem is going to be about. Also, almost everyone that has lived in some kind of neighborhood can relate to it. Anyone that has had a mean neighbor can in some way share this type of experience. Or maybe it’s just a memory of that one house everyone knew you cannot go around or into; parents are always telling their children to stay away. The image that almost immediately popped into my head was The Sandlot. The next image that came to mind from the poem was when Lux says "and mowed his lawn, his dry quarter-acre, the machine slicing a wisp from each blades tip." The lines use a lot of imagery to create a scene for the reader. The line depicts him mowing the lawn every day. It suggests that he lives a very meticulous or tedious and planned lifestyle. He mows everyday at six o’clock no matter if it’s spring, summer, or fall. This leads me to believe that this man is a man of habit. Lux also says if he could, he would mow the snow. The poem shifts somewhat and depicts him as being somewhat uptight and miserable, living this same kind of boring or depressed lifestyle day after day. The poem then goes on to describe his wife. Lux claims she is like “shoebox paper”. She is brittle and very easy to break. He states that she is fragile, that she is like a “broken apron.” The line suggests that in some way he “broke” her or seriously hurt her leading into the next line, "As if into her head he drove a wedge of shale." It soon after mentions his daughter, “Years later, his daughter goes to jail.”