It feels so good to return to the front porch where it's warm again and I can drink coffee, think, write, observe, and wonder who all these people are and what they're about. I'm not sure Karal likes the return...although she loves my shoulders to sleep on as she, too, keeps an eye on the neighborhood.
From the Way I See It
~b.r.crandall
He’s outgrown his pants,
this blonde, middle-school
pixie-stick boy
wearing coke-bottled glasses,
running to and from bells,
from the hefty-cinch-sak bullies
who nip and claw
at his ankles -
the ones always exposed
as the waters run high.
At the pink house,
behind the neglect of kudzu and rot,
I’m pretty sure
he’s widowed now,
alone, and confused.
His car leaves for long hours,
and sometimes
raccoons leave the 2nd floor
window, the one where
garbage bags replace glass panes,
and carpenter bees
have gutted
panels.
I can’t help chirping circus music
as she walks by, this mini-Pinscher
of a woman in Reeboks,
who windmills her arms
as if she always needs to pee.
I see they’re selling now.
Probably Covid - too much for them,
their anxious home of toddlers,
Gulf War, I’m guessing, PTSD -
the American flags.
A smile has been replaced with nerves,
paranoia, Uber eats, &
Amazon diapers.
Their boy plays outside, sometimes,
unlocking an imagination with rubber boots
and wiffleball bats. I’m amazed by
how quickly he becomes a dinosaur
before his papa asks, Weh yuh den Pon?
after a day of delivering mail.
Several women in Kente cloth
scurry to Godzilla to bring him back inside.
Her littlest duckling
is a quacking brat,
one that squawks squeamishly
as they waddle along
the sidewalk,
following the older duck
who skips with a doll.
Mama needs
more Vodka for that one -
that’s for sure..
Chodź mi pomóc!
Chodź mi pomóc!
she screams from
her home of pierogis,
Gołąbk, and
Placki Ziemniaczane,
Mój mąż upad!
Mój mąż upad!
The son and
his partner
only visit when
they can -
too much real-estate
in a big apple
to sell.
He might be 16,
but they bought him a Mustang, anyway,
and no one is sure where his
mother is. Grandpa’s bark
outdoes all the other
neighborhood dogs.
And the birds,
those fucking birds
are having
sex again —
only the few
get morning worms.