Poetry

She’s always been a tomboy, Mama Vic says, Mouthy.
Runnin’ the roads. Not comin’ home, and as she speaks

You are the country at war and the city ablaze.
You are the flags lining Fourth Street and the singer

Once, I was a daughter of this place:
daughter of Gwen, granddaughter
of Leretta, great of Eugenia McGee.

Announcing a new poetry project in the spirit of the Federal Writers’ Project.

Garlands of trinitarias shade an artist’s studio,
plainer than their synagogue halfway down the hill,
its ceiling painted with stars, a glass chandelier.

[…]

Can’t say he walked the walk.
Talked it, but everybody
did that, everybody

Summer ended powerfully—as if God
had snapped a branch from his mightiest oak
and thundered: “Enough.” The sky dimmed.

In search of pasture, a place to lie down in.
Back to the mother breast
or a dream of return