Category: community

movingon lookingback

first tomatoes
stew and soup
onions cabbage carrots squash lentils beets
bread and butter
fish and plums
ornate lock in rabbi soul
circular chapel blue green pieces
shining dove in water
liniment in oil
service overseas
walking in flowers to sound of crows

museum and synagogue at sunrise
(the jewish museum of maryland was founded in 1960 to save the lloyd street synagogue from demolition)

for coca-colas

ghostly eyes linger about posts
helicopters of human torso hover
immaculate hands rise skyward earthward
mouths shout bombs prayers hailing echowire
over bloody knees aching thighs tumbling
shoulders concrete into ribs frozen mud
unite us to bury
thunder galloping home

goal posts at sunrise
(texans became colts at memorial stadium in 1953 and champions on national tv in 1958)

pleasure dome

fight through pleasant exciting environment
closer to venice urban undiluting
in perplexing injustice awkward triangular
through economic valley in magnetism field
touch side windows out on city
from three small squares
mixintenseuse
on slope bridging superblock

charles center at sunrise
(the greater baltimore committee formed in 1956 and bonds for its first project, charles center– between liberty street, hopkins place, and lombard, charles, and saratoga streets– were approved by voters in 1958)

community relations

any person aggrieved
discriminationsegregation
dwelling opportunity
familial person natural
orientation place public
covenant
population composed
care groups practice place
hardship social
arbitrary age chance equal
liberties
untold anxieties
permanent effects

city hall from gay and saratoga at sunrise
(the city council passed an equal employment ordinance in 1956)

hurrah

a brutal line drive slices sharply
starting southwest then due east into the sun
over green field raked dust custom
over fading fence into sports shirts called out over radio
strikezone dizzy disappearing
snap go fling take swing bunt
depression safe out in bluesky brightlights
howl swear run jump fight

memorial stadium from shallow center at sunrise
(anheuser-busch forced the browns out of st. louis and other team owners forced bill veeck out of baseball, temporarily, and the orioles landed at memorial stadium in 1954)

some part of you down there

singing all over
deep rivers
no ways tired this far
day after day born
turning around you
in pleasure and grief
speak in red rising sun a few days more
fields of gold pure water
for never yes forever
bound to earth
explode in lightning

lyric at sunrise
(lyric music hall owners refused to have marian anderson perform there in 1953, but relented in 1954, to the joy of a sell-out audience)

blessing

shining
sunny plenty
magic circling
naked unafraid walking beauty
clamor crying morning
red is blood
ringing laughter

mondawmin mall at sunrise
(mondawmin mall, between gwynns falls parkway and tioga parkway and reisterstown road and monroe street, opened in 1956, with some stores serving only white customers)

calm afterstorm

after blasts of yells and blows
burn off with fog and mist
block walls painted light green drip
in halls without windows on copper skies
or with grated windows and crossed shadows
children move and pass as whispers
short and long
plump and lank
pale and brown so beautiful
shining tracks
elfish light
blue black green and orange
body of brothers sisters winding into rope
on a lonesome way thru tripping feet and spilled food
on a whirl spinning around
they row

southern high school at sunrise
(after several days of nasty confrontations and some arrests in 1954, students at newly integrated southern high school on warren avenue somehow persevered)