Danger Zone
Poem Date: February 7, 2026
Contest Title: Pick-A-Title, Vol 55
Sponsor: Edward Ibeh
Danger Zone, The first time I saw blood on pavement, I was eight, and I did not run. I had already learned how danger sounds before it shows its face. Where I grew up, night carried warnings, and the air knew when to hold its breath. Streets remembered what happened on them, and so did we.We played anyway, running through dirt that had witnessed grief, laughing between alarms, coloring over cracks left behind. Childhood lived close to loss, close enough to feel its heat. They called us grown because our eyes learned to watch early, because we knew when to duck before we knew why. This was our baptism, not in water but in knowing. The danger zone had no borders, only lessons. And still, something in us rose, learning how to stand, how to stay soft, how to survive without disappearing.
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