Stars

New Orleans, a Tuesday, 7:30 A.M.

I’m sipping coffee at a McDonald’s on Canal

when two young black men, early twenties perhaps,

walk in, buying nothing. Suddenly,

I’m aboard a mothership,

streaking toward the farthest stars.

One, like a fly, bobs the aisles, sweaty

in his Crown Royal muscle shirt.

Gym shorts hanging off his ass,

headset in his ears, he pantomimes

a singer and dances a Mardi Gras mambo

in July, with himself, second-lining

silky-smoothly across the floor, out the door,

onto the parking lot—his own block party

without the block.

The other, well-groomed, small backpack,

talks loudly, eloquently to himself

about home, what it is, isn’t and should be, then,

facing the faces, he launches a soliloquy

of senseless babble,

and you sense the other—

the voices, a stage, curtain and cast,

his fans and followers looking on,

inside his head.

I’m gazing stars. Drawn to the glow

of their wayward worlds,

I can’t help

but pause, watch and listen.

I’m entertained,

but scared, because they’re black men

and I’m one, too,

with a son and grandsons of my own,

and I can’t help

but ponder: what’s loose,

what’s broken, what’s gone wrong,

what’s the fix?