Poet & Teacher

Somewhere between tragic and heartbreaking
there is light

down the second avenue tunnel
a boy sits organizing papers
beside two men
topless, passed out
half alive or dead
we rush by.

Above ground two give free
newspapers we refuse,
though those two smile
in the rain.

The avenue smells of garbage, restaurant remnants,
late nights begetting early mornings.

A man ties his tie as he hurries
by, another staggers curb to storefront
head hung, heavy,
heavy the air seems today.

A woman walks her son
towards school
holding a teddy bear.

She weaves him between
the staples of this scene—
pigeons coming too close,
streets cracking at the seams.

The school scuffles
with hip high folk
wondering what will come.

Somewhere between tragic and heartbreaking
there is light.

“We’ve been warned against offering the people of this nation false hope. But in the unlikely story that is America, there has never been anything false about hope.”- Barack Obama

I am worried for you
in a way I can no longer afford
to worry for myself—
knowing the limits of my own
hopefulness
the ways I can
pick myself up,

the ways I cannot.
The disappointment of not
getting up again, as high,
of witnessing
change.

You have the dictionary
seeing still (the unknown, be still)
what seems impossible.

Wastefully you wage it
on worthlessness
(those barely tremors
of sometimes laughter)
wealthy you are
with not knowing
the worth of self.

If only I knew how
to balance beam
this axis for you.

If I knew
to teach you fear,
or let you become afraid?

Circuitous logic paves roundabouts
to follow, arriving one after the other
(in rapid succession).

Will your future be merely a tautology?
Or am I to undo logic?
And who am I (?) to undo you
as if future were something
I once knew?

There are always exits.

Along First Avenue
houses line up
between what was and what is
boarded up windows
must lie in mere frames
where within light once streamed.

Traversing distance
in exponential leaves
commuters face the inexplicable
blocks of outlines compiled.
Fracturing venom and phloem back
stacked apartments.
Our supposed to senses distribute neural notions
Self-creating disconnections
in search of wonder only alone
in unknowing.

And yet I want to tell you
that this morning the sun rose
calm over the East River
though I did not see it
I know
it did

I wanted to say, “Colors
spread like only sky can,”
(but how afraid was I
laughed and said
something tangible instead
so the image in your head
would bear resemblance to what I see
to me—
though that image would
have nothing to do
with the joy of having seen it
or even you.
And then this pretense would be
simply what it seems—again.
But at least, alas, you will likely not
have disappeared).

Frames discolor and I cannot trace
the person whose memory has been erased
by a new layer of paint that comes and comes
with this continuance
—tan window frames on steely blue
color schemes old and new
inside which eyes have peered
out onto this scene for many years
the woman who sweeps
the same cement squares
past the Polish Deli, daily
kids recycle getting older
tailing rushed mothers
to a place that abducts trust
in the name of self-sufficience.

It rained earlier,
now it’s clear,
seasons never cease,
and I’m stuck
on the sky
in lieu of an explanation
to make me believe in this trek
up and back, up and back
making a journey
worthwhile to share.

The graffiti says snow
though it doesn’t often above subwayed tunnels.
When it gets too warm it rains the many individuals
never known.

Wonder must be collected,
kept, spreading itself before us
unsortable, in no need
of sorting.

A woman spits seeds into her palm.