Newton Street Redux
Jari Thymian
When I first saw inner city streets, airlines still allowed
smoking. I was eighteen, a volunteer from a dairy farm
the summer before college. I knew field work,
Beethoven, meat and potatoes. Cows gazing at clouds.
But in the South End of Boston, hundred degree days,
jungle-like humidity, riots broke out, gunshots
in the park. Drug addicts, hookers slept on our front
steps. Bottles, brown bags, haze of smoked pot.
Trains rattled our halfway house every few minutes.
By day, I cleaned bathrooms, painted apartments,
Soul Train on the radio. Hot nights, dancing
in the park to salsa, merengue. Every skin glistened.
BB King sang in Boston Commons with Lucille.
A street-smart volunteer from Newark gave
my first kiss, my skin like maracas, body cells
speeding to the gourd’s shell. Cha-chá, christened.
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