Here we are, Mike, in this box of a chapel. Late June.
Christmas greens, hung once and forgotten, longing
for snow. Somebody's radio leaks through the transom.
A guard's face, curious, in the back window. Here
we are. Reading the Lesson. Singing the hymns.
No inmates. No Readers here. Only God's own,
as His words thread through us all.
The service done, as you leave for your lockup, I remark
on your innocent selves. Afterward, on the street,
as the sun melts off the glass wall of your building,
I realize what shackles have melted from me, how
we've all come a little bit closer to freedom,
today, here in Flatbush, as our heritage claims us,
as the bonds fall like light to our feet.
