"thursday report to yedidiyah"

thursday report to yedidiyah

 

 

a neighbor today tried to hustle me

had his woman’s groceries and

her tv to sell to me

even her wax flowers and earrings

i have no idea why she keeps him

the city is hard enough

stoic days in the listless pools of blue poverty

a wall of age rising between the morning and hope

i told him that i was not sad

not sad enough to buy her groceries

not sad enough to listen to his habit rap rhetoric

but  alive enough and beautiful enough

to stand in the hand of god and rebuke him

 

from my window on the street each evening

a certain bus always shakes and yawns to a stop

a few bright people fall out into the shadows

they are stars forming in the orange dusk

i see her coming home

her shoulders make small gallops in the muted light

wearing the brown day like incense and liniment

her makeup is gone

 

at the stoplight

three gaunt brothas gather on one corner

he stands opposite them

he follows her home

stalemated at the intersection

dark traffic hurtles sound

each screaming brake hissing accuses him

every revving motor refuting a lie he told

he never looks at her

is she his sister/mother/cousin/woman?

they are as ambiguous as me

face in the window watching the stars come

later after silences that swell fever

she bursts and wasps torrent red all over the walls

i hear her scream at him

the sentences stack hot against the evening

something is missing

the groceries a child’s bike or a small oven

he leaves slamming the shrill iron gates

his breath blooms on the street like cauliflower

 

the neighbor women gather to see

i hear their ancient voices

one is very mothering

the others follow in residual kindness

they have all known men who have hurried toward death

they have all limped through weeks with

shards of glass beneath their breasts

they caucus and accuse him of vulgarity

their mourning is my evening concert

their sighs areviolins and cellos

a child is a flute

one woes above them like an oboe

then they are gone

 

everywhere

night expands across the rooftops

from my window

i can see the last silver of day waning in the trees

high above

the world is the most beautiful intense navy blue

falling in great curtains from space

it is a dream waiting to be wandered through

and i am an open hand  spinning in space

car lights come into sight and

boon calm moons like conductor’s fire

i start to sing

then i see her go out into the wide night watching for him

she has decided

her arms folded in her jacket

quick steps to check the corner for him

coming near the alley she hears me

she looks and waves

 

this is our time here together in long beach

oceans and ships offshore and all these narrow streets

slow weeks opaque with small disappointments

then she has passed

a window goes dark across the alley

then another on the street closes its eye

-come knock at my door, yedidiyah

bring good news and something you may have written

i am looking for someone to laugh with

before this poem makes me blue