अंकल अल Five

Number One Manong Uncle Al Five May 9 2009

The winds pickup, sing the song of the siren
Heat seeps out from worn asphalt like mourner's tears
Tenement windows open telling tales
An emmigrant's song of long tradition
Spills out into shadowed alleyways
Highways to the soul

Fried rice and chicken sing song summer air
A thousand feet beat a rhythm on concrete drums
Pounding, marching, walking in toil
Traveler's tales are passed along Stockton Street
Tradition flows from fountains of thought
Eat the fruit of family

Manong Number One solitary
Still life thrust into motion through a crowd
Like Dim Sum for a hungry mind
Like weeds through sidewalk cracks
He will find a way
Feet beat songs on the worn sidewalks

Pen and paper, mind and thought
Sitting in a neon noodle palace on Grant
Human nature sketched out in pencil and ink
A thousand stories told within a cup of teas
Manong number one takes them in
Their smell wanders through the crowded streets

The air grows hot with children's dreams
With old men's memories of a distant home
Thought black and white now vivid technicolor
Feet shuffling through promised decades
Eye wide open to endless possibility
Manong Number One watches the parade of humanity

Watching, Writing, etching thought in paper glass