Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Latitude/Longitude/Attitude

I picture ripped jeans, red and black
knee patche’d punk rock kids,
shouting at cars driving by:
fuck this!
bollocks that!
anarchy!
And I laugh.

I picture my streets slithering around,
like a snake hugging the ankles
of unaware farmers digging in fields:

My streets create their own romanticism,
their own mysteries begin to unravel like
and undone scarf,
the knit wool slowly and quietly giving way
to the pull of the near spring warmth.

They wrap around
bollocks
My childhood memories, bicycle rides
and walks, getting stares from the punks,
with their skateboards.

Setting is mapped in lots of different ways:
latitude
longitude
attitude.

I wander on,
eying my brown turned hands as a Tootsie
melts into my mouth and on my fingers;
I will manipulate then to picking up stones, sticks,
toys that fell out of trees.

My streets hide me from disasters
like being lost.

I can’t imagine a world where spring doesn’t
feel like this,
where the knot of Poland, Ohio is a tangle
waiting to be sorted out,
by young boys determined to become
explorers.

1 comment:

Lyrically speaking said...

ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhh love this one