Black Man Ordering Dinner

How y’all doin’ t’night,
I wou’ like this t’go, please.

Y’all got hot wings?
Hot wings?
A’ight, I wou’ like a poun’a half’a
hot wings.
Hol’ on.

YO! Montgom’ry!
Wha’ y’all want f’sauce?
We got
ranch, we got
bleu cheese, we got
dij—
Ranch?
Ranch.

Y’all got cheesebread?
Okay, cheesebread.
Y’all got two-liters?
Hol’ on, hol’ on—YO!
Wha’ y’all wanna drink?
We got
Coke, we got
Di’ Coke, we got
Cherry Coke, we got
Dr. Pep—
no, Mr. Pibb…
Cherry Coke.

How much, man?
Eighteen fo’ty-one, eighteen fo’ty-one…
There y’go.
A’ight, thanks, man.
Hot wings…

Love You Kids

Copters clip to the clouds as their
lost luggage looks upward,
“I’m still here,” and down below
shooters of looters lay the law.

Pilots peer at the roof-stranded refugees
but they only see black mold
dotting the dome.

Two poems

Will I Get a Sucker Afterwards?

I sit in the swivel chair,
receiving my sixty-seventh haircut.
Hundreds of snippets
dance slowly downward toward the cold, white floor
where they'll eventually get swept up with the garbage.
Mom says my hair grows too fast.

I carry my bag,
walking to my second class.
Millions of people
dance slowly through life toward a cold, grey stone
where they'll eventually rejoin the earth.
I grow up too fast.


DOUBT

You ask me repeatedly,
like dancing Wind
lifting you toward the high,
yet I tell you,
like Centipede daunting you
on your ceiling,
it is still there.