The street was narrower
than I had imagined.
Brighter. There were people
bustling at the crosswalks
in their suits and trendy dresses.
A few loafers loitered on stoops.
We don’t have stoops in the country.
We have porches. And crickets.
But there were stoops and taxis
and museums and weird fried foods
at each corner. And there were
gaudy scarves for sale on the piss sidewalk
and a few trees encased in concrete.
I had imagined this neighborhood
many times from books and movies,
grittier, darker, more sparse
and glamorous. It was early 1990’s
and terror was a movie and not yet
a way of life. I had years of daydreams
ahead of me, a galaxy-full in my own head.
But this street was real
and live and when I walked back
and forth on it a few times, I saw it
for the gem it was, shining
not in technicolor but in sunshine.
The Word Rummager 
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