Yams Elsewhere
I wouldn’t have been here long. In this metal-faced city
one is always looking past the eyes. Down and inward.
Everything around the corner. Rounding the corner could take
days. The cherry blossoms were blooming in front of the brown
project buildings. That hexagonal garden. Where the flowers
are people carrying things. Every block. Every window.
A round thing rolling across a Cartesian plane. The Dominican
doorwoman comes around the desk to hug me. She thought
I was Latino. I want simple things like yams
elsewhere. This guy from the Flatiron District says
he wants me. My last aide said she married a man she
didn’t really love. She braided my afro into cornrows
and said now you my likkle black boy. Di gyal dem
she began. And the Harlem sky bruises before
it turns black. I want a simple thing. To be somewhere else
and feather-footed and leaning off the side of my continent.