Chris Dunn, a black man, escaped prison
in Missouri last year. Charges dropped.
Prosecutors apologized. Judges affirmed.
He walked. The state wants him back in.
This same year, the SAF retook Khartoum,
where Charles “Chinese” Gordon died,
at the confluence of the White and Blue Nile.
It is reported to be beautiful. Who are “we”
for whom a few million are anonymous?
A parking lot in a nearby strip mall fills
with mostly white protesters protesting
a mostly white presidency. Video presents
a snow field of faces. The reporter calls them
“people” who lack defined demographics.
Easter morn, I break out from writing this,
walk past Sacred Grounds, the suppressed
St. Cabrini, lawns unmown after days
of rain, to a Zen center to sit and be.
During tea, we lament the troubling news.
On my way home, two red-tailed hawks court
with ever tightening circles, until talons
interlock and they fall. But only so far.
In the end, he will convince her to nest
in the hundred-year-old oak beside the tracks.
I watch them disappear behind a house
that holds an American flag. A sports logo
replaces the stars. The stripes, the colors
of a team struggling through a tough season.
Fans question the players lack of conviction.
