The Universe of Neighborhoods
David J Walker
At this point
All thoughts of the future are laughable
As we gather and laugh a lot as affable
Senior citizens everyone
The glory days are long gone
but relived
Wednesday afternoons
at the tavern
where the beer is cold and the
old men bold
retelling
The old jokes as if they were new
(In low voices of course, times have changed you know)
To the many who are gone
we raise our mugs
In remembrance
And drink to them
whom we loved
To those girls and boys from the same
Universe neighborhood noise
of a low rent
Inner city society all its own
Where we atone for our sins but
Still grin as we toast our beers
and remember them
I had to pass these words on to you. The following sentence as a radical, joyful practice that extends in three directions, to others, To our opponents, and to our selves. If we can be enjoined, To when we see a stranger, Or someone different than us, we can think and say, you are a part of me, that I do not yet know. This simple sentence if applied in practice, can transform a relationship, a community, a culture, even the nation.
Neighborhoods ravaged by some youth of today,
too lazy to work, and a drop out of school,
but what can one say.
Mothers can't control them, and no daddy around,
they just prowl the neighborhoods in their
small towns.
What they don't understand, is most people
work hard, and they are at risk, of someone
whipping them down.
I know of one place, I have seen it myself,
the police say they are watching them, and
they are about to send them, straight to a cell.
I guess they had rather work, picking up trash
on the side of a road, with no freedom at all,
wow, what a goal.