ABOUT

CONTENTS

EDITORIAL

ARCHIVE

LAGNIAPPE

MAST

SUBMISSIONS

 
THREE POEMS
by Jackie Sheeler

On the 13th of September, 2001...

This date, the old president said
in a speech we listened to on tape

(as if it had nothing to do with us)

as if it came from some universe of disaster
where we, modern and charmed, did not reside:

This date will live in infamy.

On the 13th of September, 2001,
two men walk behind me on Sixth Avenue.

One says, her birthday is tomorrow.
The other sucks his teeth and grunts in sadness.

I turn. My birthday, I say, was September 11th --

Another suck and grunt from the mute.
I'm so sorry, says the talker.

For the first time in 44 years
I am consoled over my birthdate.

This will happen to me again.



NUYONEWS
-for Bob

There it is, my name on a card in a Roledex on the desk of a man famous enough for the New York Times. Sunday's magazine section: paper thick as raw silk, seven-figure advertising spreads, linguists, ethicists, pundits and here -- on page 38 -- a whole graph of words from my friend. They describe him well, rumpled & buzzing above Duane Street, hatless hair in its usual condition of levity, carbonated language snapping out of his mouth. Lingual frenzy.

We sweat and struggle at the keyboard, knuckledeep in webdesign and the gibbering banners of AOL. I touch his shoulder, guide him through onscreen codes with an unpolished nail. The article says he has done more than anyone to restore the rattle. The studio smells like Monday.



Thugwalk

Gun tucked in a Fubu waistband, he ran.
The piece, loosening, wriggled;
fingers snugged it close, legs pumping.
Late shift undercovers noticed and pursued,
captured, questioned. Cuffed him up, took him in.

Let the courtroom cartoon wars begin.
Let the thug be named defendant.
Let the shysters scramble madly for his rights,
and a twisted judge shrug across the gavel.

The man admits he had the pistol,
locked and loaded, just above his groin,
but it was no Exhibit A, clear-bagged and red-tagged,
for the DTs to peep as he ran by --
oh yes, he was running, it was 2am,
but running through the night is not a crime,
now, is it? -- the gun was invisible, so
the perp is a victim. Cookie-cutter
PC parrots rise up in a chorus of
Profiling! Profiling! Profiling!

But isn't this the right kind of profile?
Portrait of a mugger, portrait of a murderer, cameo
in a movie titled no good comes of this in any color.

The judge, frowning in his taxpayer robe, disagrees:
running with one hand over what seems to be a pistol
through a blasted neighborhood in the middle of the night
is not enough reason to frisk a man if he happens to be black.

Last week the thug walked,
guilty as a fingerprint
and free as Legal Aid.