E 140^th Street Redemption Song

Micah Towery

I may write

the saddest words I heard

the old man on the corner say:

my baby, she left me

without a word, without

a mumblin’ word.

It’s like some

bullshit hallelujah

someone has been singing for years,

and we are all waiting

to be called sons again.

Tonight I find

that there is nothing left

of my prayers but the moon,

which is knotted like a rosary

in the night, hung without care

on a rearview mirror.

There are Latin women

pouring out onto the sidewalks

from gay bars

and we wonder if we still might

have a chance.

I may write the saddest words

again—the victim, the paschal lamb

in front of a joyful crowd—

but it would be

as if the

cat’s tongue were rubbing

its own sandpaper.

The crackheads look

sad in the blue-in-green

glow of my dash,

hungry on the stoop without a fix. They know

how rain falls on the wicked,

and the king is never

without a lover.