Air Is Thick

Whatever happened to the fear of falling off your
bike, getting to know the kids in new neighborhoods,
bringing home a report card with D’s in Spelling
and Conduct, knowing your parents would kick
your ass? There’s worse. Your 4-year old sister whistles
through crack pipes. Your uncle is slapped,
punched, gutted in front of a liquor store.
The police approach you, lock your arms,
slip drugs into your pocket.
Lost bullets shatter barbershop-windows
and you run hunched, behind a car,
a building,
behind dumpsters coated with graffiti.
You turn on the light, the air is still thick
with heat. The sky is still midnight.
Your skin remembers many scars.

*Norman Golar is a Master of Fine Arts candidate for the Creative Writing Program at The University of Alabama. He received his Bachelor of Arts in Creative Writing (2002) at Knox College, located in Galesburg, Illinois. He is originally from Chicago, Illinois, but has resided in the South (while pursuing current graduate degree) for over three years. Two of his poems—“G.H.E.T.T.O.” and “February 17th”—appear in the Spring 2004 issue of Touchstone.