HERE Here where the alleys cross all the ground has been asphalted over for parking behind the houses that have become businesses. This used to be where children played, the plot of vegetables was laid out, backyard chickens scratched. The twenties, perhaps. "Ja-Da" reproduced phonographically floated outside through the screen. And earlier? Horse hoof clops, buoyant confidence of the Christians, class contention, the rail lines coming to the center of town. Before that, grieving over the Civil War that had been cheered forward from all the porches around, soldiers parading away. And even before, taking over from those who had been marched out of sight, saving an occasional thought such as Indian Creek for them, otherwise refusing to remember. And then those long millenia backward we scarcely hope to know, the time before men when a shaggy beast pressed a hoof here or a dragon strode. The time this spot lay under the sea accumulating a fine dust of tiny bodies into mud and then rock. And this spot was here when it was all hot gasses or a space of nothing, this spot here where the alleys cross.