Old people return to this square
where I feed the pigeons,
where once their lovers were,
where my hands burst with flakes of bread
and the fat, gray birds
squabble at my feet,
where there’s nothing, not even
a butterfly or a ribbon of captured sunlight
could resurrect anything of a kiss
beyond that wrinkled stain
that mutters like aloe
in Germanic cross-winds
because the great cement expanse
is empty of all miracles,
merely about debris and commotions
and hungers or, at least,
anticipation of hungers.
Old people sit beside me
and speak of how empty the town is,
even while we tourists come
to photograph the landscape,
they say see how the tower blocks
the sunlight, how the walls of
the church make everything dark and dumb,
how even the wine-cellars won’t
begrudge a drop these days
and the cops are, well the cops are
what you see when the a wound does
not heal, when it festers.
Old people do not stay in the hotel,
do not drink in the American lounge
and listen to Carl play Gershwin
on the piano.
They do not have the maps,
have forgotten, if they ever even knew,
the opening hours of the museums.
Old people borrow my bread,
stuff white tufts of food
down the gullet of these bold companions.
"We remember from the war,"
they say, without expanding on that.
His car has broken down.
He wants to use the phone.
You're too frightened to say
anything but yes.
You show him where the parlor is
while you remain behind in the kitchen,
eying the bread-knife,
calculating in your head
how quickly your hand could reach it.
He's in the parlor
talking softly to someone.
You can't make out a word.
So few people see that room.
Other than you,
almost no one has been
in it alone for years.
And even longer than that
has it been since someone
spoke so much that you
couldn't hear
to someone on the other end
you did not know,
would never know.
He leaves with a "thank you"
and is gone.
You slip nervously into that parlor,
pretending to look for
boot-marks on the carpet
when really it's something more.
Does it feel different?
Do the echoes of that
mysterious conversation linger?
Suddenly, the phone rings.
The noise jangles down your spine.
You pick up the receiver.
It's your daughter.
She sounds so familiar,
warm, loving,
like the voice of a room
returned to you.
two cops show up on bicycles,
one black, one white,
just like on TV,
what's the problem here, says the white one,
and one kid's still grabbing the other by the collar
and the other's sweating gallons
but they're frozen in that pose
like a poster for an action movie on the Showcase wall,
"no problem, officer," says one,
"no problem, officer, "repeats the other,
black cop jerks them apart,
"get the fuck outta here"
just like the kid
they found the other night
rolling about on the sidewalk
outside the burned-out tenement,
wrestling with the bullet in his chest
and the spurting blood winning,
"one less asshole on the street,"
said the white cop
or the kid they caught red-handed
stealing from the music store in the mall,
"my kid gets this shit for free off the internet,"
said the white cop
and the black cop just nodded
it's always kids,
like after dark,
the grownups lock themselves inside
their fancy houses
and everyone under nineteen takes over
but for two cops on bicycles
who show up when the one woman
who dares show her face after twilight
has her purse snatched right out of her hand
outside the 7/11,
"kids," she snarls
and the guy complaining
about the broken window
or the graffiti spray-painted
on the wall of his apartment house,
more kids
kids broke into the costume jewelers,
kids ransacked the home of the family
away on vacation,
kids killed their parents,
kids stole every dime their ancient grandfather
had stashed away in a dresser drawer,
black cop says to white cop,
"if I had my way..."
and his voice stops short
as a kid in the distance catches his eye
and the white cop says,
"let's get that motherfucker"
and off they go, guns raised,
peddling into the night
it's all kids running
and cops on bicycles,
and one black, one white,
the cops catch up,
grab one, a second,
but the third, the fourth get away
one black kid, one black kid,
steal themselves some bicycles,
ride off into the night,
cops in another life
John Grey has been published recently in Agni, Worcester Review, South Carolina Review and The Pedestal with work upcoming in Poetry East and REAL.