Читать книгу Stony the Road - Harold J. Recinos - Страница 26

the last time I looked in the

alley there were clotheslines

stretched from wall to wall in

it, with cheap threads tightly

pinched by pins to them, and

faces looking out of windows

longing to be someplace other

than the South Bronx. I made

up stories about the dark shirts

like the one flapping like a flag

that belonged to Angel’s father

in prison, the black shawls hung

to dry worn by the old woman in

love with church, the pretty blouses

worn by Jessica that she made look

handmade, and the occasional nasty

blond hair wig. I saw these things

almost daily wondering whether they

could pray or know anything about the

blocks exhausted gods, could they tell

me why the police batons beat Willy

long enough to make the buildings

scream and the little children screech

with tiring fear. on the way to public

school 66 each morning I would

glance at the alley aware the rest of

the city doesn’t even know the people

who only own clotheslines live here,

then by the end of a week I would visit

the Saturday night confessional to tell

an Irish priest who just learned to speak

Spanish the damn stone where we live

is just never rolled away.