In Little Rock

Perhaps, this morning, we’re there,

normal and soon forgotten, as news is

when it’s passed over breakfast, like love,

something that’s always cast, too

heavy to hold for long. We breathe it in,

the bacon, the coffee. We listen to the little

quavers as the local tongues, water over rock,

rise and fall, like stones skipping soft

into the white that smoothed them. The women

speak like grandmothers, softly

opening their mouths, opening

and drawing advice from themselves,

like biscuits, and offering in kindness

a little more than anyone could ask, more

than anyone can take. I know their pitying.

It looks like patience, the look on everyone’s

faces as the peddler shuffles in his blindness,

black hand held open, everyone awaiting

the hiss of door, the whisper in everyone’s

throats, breaking from patience into pleasure.