Gabriel Welsch
Jimmy John’s in the Jackhammer Street
Eyes the hue of horizon at sea,
He talks in the jackhammer street,
Handing me a sack of sandwich.
At the first cool of fall the bricks
Around us finally not hot to the touch,
I say nice to be out on a bike, huh?
The traffic still snarls, but happy in the sun
the way weather makes a mood. Orange vests
lunch on the curb as the bus hisses by.
My mother’s down there, he says, pointing
toward where we imagine Florida must be,
in a hurricane path, sustained
winds, storm surge, category number. She’s
anchored, he says, still gazing to Uptown
and the hills between the rivers
in the double wide in her retirement place.
I start to talk but he still has yet
to look at me. I haven’t spoken to her for years.
The lunching vests laugh and a bike bell
rings us back in a rush, just missing
a messenger wreck. He waves, bikes away.
His backpack heaves side to side
As his legs pedal and he veers
Between orange cones
like handwriting, a stutter on a post card,
his legs working to get to what’s next,
carrying it all on his back.