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and these are the few who love me

Wednesday 27 June 2012

Urban Shots





URBAN RENEWAL 
                    ~BY YUSEF KOMUNYAKAA


The sun slides down behind brick dust,   
today’s angle of life. Everything
melts, even when backbones   
are I-beams braced for impact.

Sequential sledgehammers fall, stone   
shaped into dry air
white soundsystem of loose metal   
under every footstep. 
Wrecking crews,
men unable to catch sparrows without breaking   
wings into splinters. Blues-horn
mercy. Bloodlines. Nothing   
but the white odor of absence.

The big iron ball   
swings, keeping time
to pigeons cooing in eaves   
as black feathers
float on to blueprint   
parking lots.