STING

Slowly and carefully
year by year,

I have set up
the perfect perimeter—

refined the edges,
groomed the green deputies,

built and maintained all the 

special equipment:

mirror shades, Thermoses, 

caution tape, toothpicks.

Any minute,
I'll catch the man

I'm afraid of

becoming

(a look-alike, they tell me,
fiendishly clever)

and cuff him 

for talking funny, acting a bit off,

or getting the least little anything 

wrong.