And the old men, supervising grown grandsons, nephews, <br />any man a boy given this chance of making <br />a new sidewalk outside the apartment building where <br />some of them live, three old men and their wives, <br />the aging unmarrying children, and the child <br />who is a cousin, whose mother has sent her here <br />because she doesn't know what to do with her, <br />she's out of control, she wants to be a gangsta, and <br />the old folks talk to her as if she minds them <br />and already has that respect for their years her mother <br />finally grew into. The girl who does not look <br />like them eats and eats and sleeps late, sneaks away <br />when they are busy, and tonight will write herself <br />all over the sidewalk while it is still wet but <br />the old have gone inside, and the grown gone home, <br />and her mother who is somewhere overseas thinks of <br />writing her that long long letter, but decides not to.<br /><br />Forrest Hamer<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/charlene-n-booker-4ever/
