It is the board in the fence,
shifted only slightly to the right,
opening a breach in your understanding
of the neighbor—
and making you wonder which way they lean.
Is it safe to bring a hammer and a nail,
or would that cross the line itself,
that invisible border saying, without words,
where your limits lie,
what may be carried in your hands,
or whether a weapon still counts as speech?
Because you might expose what is already
plain,
and then they would have to set it right—
straighten the board by making a hammer of you,
in their grim reckoning,
and leave you on the fence, a warning to whoever forgets where they do not belong.
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