I'm hunched under this decking in rural Virginia

spying the opulent sunlit valley as through a large keyhole

while the owner of the lavish farmhouse sits upstairs

tapping her wafer thin computer.

I'm the one who wanted to be a writer

but I play the part of the perfect guest

putting the host's garden in order,

yanking out burdock and thistles in the mid-day heat,

digging grit, mulch and gypsum into unyielding clay.

Vulnerable to ticks and snakes I crouch here,

staring at the giant mouth of the ground hog hole

and think suddenly of my grandmother,

in service at age thirteen to the lady of the manor.

She too spent most of her life on her knees,

looking into chimneys, cleaning grates,

scrubbing slates and rust coloured kitchen tiles.

Even at weekends she was still down there, praying

and grieving her many lost children

till her final reprieve (if that's the right word)

by cancer.

Is it because of her, some kind of moral genetics,

that I sweat here under the decking

believing I have to earn my bed

and access to the well-stocked fridge

(gargantuan by English standards)

while my friend sits coolly playing her keyboard

like the princess Danae in her tower,

divinely showered by gold?

Is it race or class, karma or just bad luck

- how the cards have happened to fall?

Then she appears with tall tumblers of iced drinks,

her thanks so prolific

I almost think it's none of these things at all,

but simply, on my side,

an act of sheer good will.