something like a sigh from the sidewalk

The stoop was all noise 
   with people’s mouths
slapping like bat wings
shooting at each other
   like machine guns
     on this hot,
       street-angry day

Grass, soft and green
   grew somewhere
and in a small section
of a lost soul
   spring sang quietly
while cement and stone
   and black tar
reflected blazing sharp
   sunlight back
     into the day
       or into vacant eyes

Among the dark elbows
   and knees
a frail bony child
imagined
   a forest
   of brown
weathered bark
the sweat soaked
   skin of leaves
     glistened and sparkled
       over veins and pores 

An odor of
   decomposing life
     was so pungent
     and real
the child 
   snapped
     back…

The cry from her heart
   was not heard
     or was it?
The giant oak crashed to the forest floor.