by Beesan Odeh
I’m leaned against my car,
scarlet,
trying to look cool ‘cause the car sure don’t
with two slashed tires and paint, chipped,
falling off like snowflakes anytime I pick up speed.
The trash who slashed them are headed this way,
a pack of animals that got no respect.
I’m outnumbered,
but the second I flash the
heater sitting tight between the band of my
ripped jeans and slender hips,
they’ll be off running down back where they came from.
You learn the hard way, in this neighborhood, you can’t trust anyone.
You learn the hard way that people don’t got your back,
not even the boys, in this neighborhood where
blood runs cold and guns are toys.
I’d say you can count on family, but they’re messed up too,
with my old lady on street corners carving scars with razors, and
Dad’s always gone, paying other women for favors, and
‘m just a burden, a responsibility no one wanted,
in and out of jail, seen too much, forever haunted.
Mama once told me I had to make a choice:
Give into it all or
make sure others hear my voice.
So I run plastic combs through greased back hair,
stuff fists in black leather pockets,
slip into old, muddied boots and wander life like space rockets.
I’ll take a long drag even though I hate smoking, ‘cause it’s my only relief from
drowning, from choking—
on all the dirt that makes staying clean so hard, especially when
living a block and a half from the bar.
I’ll kick cans and smash bottles instead of loud screaming,
ignore all the cuts, ignore my heart bleeding, and bleeding,
and beating for more;
stuck living so tough, just a
rebel boy.
Beesan Odeh lives in Youngstown, Ohio. Graduating in a few months, she isn’t going anywhere, with plans to join the NEOMFA program in the fall. When Beesan isn’t writing fiction, you can find her experimenting with poetry. She usually has an old Elvis record going on the turntable for inspiration.