-home again and guilty-

I was told

to ride in the backyard

not to cross Healy

to stay away

from Rachlin’s crazy 

junkyard

then told to ride on the sidewalk

in front of our house

and then no farther

than Quarry street.

that distance expanded

to the Pepperell Mills
on Bedford west of Quarry.

but by then it was too late

to quarantine me from the city of my birth

and I rode her far and fast
beyond the parameters
into the city dump

in search of amusements

the treasures discarded by the people.

surveying the smoldering
mountains of rubble,—

here are the beaten
baseballs in blackface for me to consider and

crusted rubber fender-flaps
with an overpowering ruby
stuck in the middle for the cherry-
red Schwinn.

we weren’t looking for trouble.

later, we walked our way

up the stairs and into the entry where
I left her leaning on the pea-green
wall of wounded plaster.

I went inside

through the spring-screeching

screen door to the kitchen
where two flies found the opportunity
to inquire within.

I stank-out the place,
saturating the first floor tenement
in the burnt melange
of the rotting city dump
and was banished to the tub
and confined to quarters.

in the kitchen,
the flies were executed with dispatch
leaving little
abstract expressions of themselves
on the counter near the sink.

in the entry, she kept to herself

leaning there as sweet as a wallflower
waiting for my time to be served
and another proposal to dance across the city.

                                             quequechan