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born                     

           -after Jeanann Verlee

i was born of Edgewood         born of al-mall quickie mart slash hookah bar
slash pizza parlor slash ministry          born of South Providence next door
with their chimi trucks and speed bumps    called us edge-hood       called us
e-dubb   called us secret handshakes and  secret language  born from fachii
and boss-man       and bogue-rocks     born of Warwick next door      with their
strip malls and baseball and long roads      born of broad street and park ave
and bicycles with pegs to stand on      and handle bars to sit on      three to a bike
no problemo    born between exurb and ghetto flanks     and the water holding us
together from beneath our city      born of Narragansett bay     of low tide
of geese     covered in black oil

in first grade summer camp the counselors pelican marched us
to the bamboo and sludge of the Narragansett bay    told us to pick up sea glass
my mom said                THEY MADE A BUNCH OF 6 YEAR OLDS PICK UP GLASS
i came home with a jar full of softened colored shards from many broken
transformations ago           a jar full of the windows of a thousand shattered
synagogues        ran my fingers along the edges that once screamed danger
tipped my salted tongue to the top part of the ocean and pretended
to crunch                      TAKE THAT GLASS AWAY FROM YOUR FACE
my mom had a fear (love) that any broken thing would break      again

i was not born      in    Edgewood     no one is born in Edgewood      but we move
and settle until the water and salt weathers us hardened     born of a flexible
that is more dangerous than hard things    born    of    Edgewood       where the
hardest out was the boy who could take more punches       not give them
still smile sea salt the next day          born of America          Online cds in bulk
stolen from wal-mart      and garage doors to tape them to     and bb guns
to shoot them with    born of the poker game on friday night in the basement
of Glenn’s house      (Patrick had bought a stolen bike from a boy named Gitchi
behind Marchetti’s restaurant while i kept look out        when the poker game gossip
told us the bike was stolen      we pelican marched to the other side of town
and took the money back     Edgewood style, we kept the bike, salted our way
home and smoked bogue-rocks in our triumph        bossman)    I won poker that
winter night        called fachi       and walked home with a pocket full of seventy five
dollars and a t-shirt off of glenn’s back       my ears tucked into a fitted cap and a silver
star of david salting my neck      shining in the midnight               like stained glass

—AARON SAMUELS


    



ISSN 2157-8079
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