hitting the "nigger pool"

-hitting the "nigger pool"-

the neighborhood was woven tightly
in a tough, italian-guy rhetoric
in attitude and language where
the mouth spoke rapidly and hand-
gestures accentuated
points of importance dynamically,
fast and furiously deliberate,
like an army at your face.
here was the place
where Italian women did for their men,

did for the kids,— where parents

and grandparents lived an arm’s-

length apart, where in our house a hand’s-

width would do.

the gas stove flamed by sulphur-

headed matches

and anthracite was down-chuted

to bins which fed the exagerated plaster-
cased furnace squatting in the cellar.

later, heating oils from contained vessels

fueled the space-heater, saturating

the tenement atmosphere
in the scent of petroleum,
the interior's scent of winter, shingled
in asbestos.

here was a sense of propriety where
one toilet served the crowded populous

and the solitary television standing
in the useable parlor was enough
to set the parameters of the extreme.

street-side, folding money was the lifeline

and the young men took pride in dropping

their hard-earned wages into the hands
of the neighborhood bagman working the small-
time hood's weekly "nigger pool."

in this place, food was a fresh-baked
fundamental bread from the baker's ovens
a stone's-throw away;

it was sugar, salted meats, potatoes and peppers
and LaRosa spaghetti, cracked from the box— 

where tomato sauces were prepared

as Mother Earth prepared for sunlight,

as grapes were prepared on the vines
tangled beneath the durable

cloth of the working-class, air-drying

on lines of rope pulleyed window to pole
and pulleyed back.
street-side, the rain-puddles evaporated
with the scent of metal rising from them
and the ballpark was active with the scent
of gasoline running through it.

later in the week, a lucky corner-dweller
would collect his winnings in cash money
and his name resonated across the neighborhood,
lofting his commonness to an exalted position.

inside, the hand-kneaded, fork-pressed
dough of the ravioli were laid to stiffen
overnight on laundered sheets,
their backsides flour-
sprinkled like pampered, infant italians.

                                                       Quequechan