Coming back from midtown
Subway Sunday slow
A Train to Brooklyn
A younger older man
He asks,
“Are you famous?”
Like Ulysees to the cyclops I say,
“I am no one.”
He begs to differ.
“You are someone.
My name is Prince.
From East New York.
I done twenty-five.
For five murders.
The po-lice shot me in the head.
My wife pulled out the bullet.
No hospital.”
“When?”
“1986.”
The crack years.
He had a story.
Many.
“I been out fourteen.
Never going back.
My wife ran the money.
I was a boss.
I was wanted in 38 states. My name Prince.
His hand was rough.
I ran the numbers.
He had to be 60.
Almost half his life
Behind walls
Still smiling
Thinking I was famous
I decided to be honest
“I’m not anyone but I’m not nobody too. Do you want to be not nobodies too ”
I love Emily Dickinson
So did Prince
“Then we can be not nobodies together.”
We didn’t know each other
But we knew our Emily Dickinson
And me my Rilke.
Poetry time another time.
“387 Myrtle.”
Him
“2078 Pitcairn.”
We punched knuckles
At Fulton Street.
Another time
A smile
We both alive.
And free.
Free as a smile can make us