JULY 28TH

Past Harlem, tracks
Glazed with rain, majestic
Buildings boarded-up
Like kings deposed
Blindfolded, forgotten
I am remembering
The various violence
That has saddled us
Unseen, the unseemly
Business in which
We find ourselves
Interminably implicated
I am remembering
The pestilence of the soul
Its fingernails violet
With mishandled wine
A woman on the subway
Who dragged her kid
Smack into a pole
Not pausing to flinch
I am remembering
The whole of my
Youth like a suitcase
That won’t shut
The way my eyes
Won’t stay closed
But rather close
Like the enormity
Of this purple rose
Wilting imperceptibly
Behind my nose
I am remembering
A woman I once loved
The length of her limbs
The weight of her skull
All that it contained
Against my thighs
There is a desert city
I long to return to
Where my family waits
As veins of light freeze
Against the horizon
And a diminutive blue
Car stalls in the middle
Of the Triborough bridge