Sonnet for 1950

All the kids came rumbling down the wood tenement

Shaky stairs, sneakers slapping against the worn

Tin tread edges, downhall came Pepo, Chino, Cojo,

Curly bursting from the door like shells exploding

Singing "I'm a Rican Doodle Dandy" and "What shall

We be today, Doctors or Junkies, Soldiers or Winos?"

Pepo put a milk crate on a Spanish Harlem johnny pump

And drops opened like paratroopers carrying war news.

Then Urban Renewal attacked the pump, cleared the slums

Blamed Puerto Rico and dispersed the Spies, blasting

Them into the Army or Anywhere Avenue in the Bronx.

And nobody, but nobody, came back from that summer.

Just as Korea was death in service to the warring Nation

The Bronx was death in service to the negligent Nation