The homeless woman on the streets of New York speaks poems
to anyone who will come near. Her voice is a hurricane bringing up
the wreckage from the back of her throat, brown hands
wild as birds as she tells passersby of the miles upon miles
her mother walked through the hot sands of Sudan,
carrying two babies on her aching back,
belly already swollen with another one.
And I wonder what it’s like for her to crack open these stories
like eggs until the yolk falls out in the form of words
that burn her mouth as they drip to the pavement.
To let loose of secrets clutched like pocket knives
before each syllable slices open skin.
And then I wonder what she would say if I pressed her palms
between mine and asked her to tell me something
she can’t tell any of these other thousands of strangers.
What pain would come forth in the form of breath and lowered eyes
that no one else would ever see unless
they bothered to simply listen, not from yards away,
but from up close.
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Street Secrets
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