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Red
Sunday dawn slinks, like raw, slow drifting silk,
along
the old row houses, still tentatively tingeing
Victorian
brick facades, with the same morning, mellow gold,
of
the last two centuries.
I
watch the gulls fly minuets between rooftops,
where
arrogant pigeons strut street-splendid, above late
sleepers.
They
await the absolute chime of church bells to raise
them for mass.
This
congregation of Poles and Mexicans, tongues mingled
in
Babel-blessings,
splash Holy water like cologne; yielding no misgivings
for
lingering shadows of late night sin.
I
relish the sound of hourly bells, thrumming to the
bone,
reminding
me I am still a part of somewhere,
despite
this imposed exile, in the unfamiliar city of my
birth;
where
vagrant birds nest more tenaciously than I abide.
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