Sing About Me Part 4

march now and something shifted in the temperature of things

not the weather, something social, something with the strings

of the blocks particular politics, the rings

of connection around amara, who she brings

to what, who shes seen with, who that means, the kings

and pawns of the bronx social chessboard and the slings

and arrows of being fourteen and visible, the stings

of attention you didnt ask for, and someone clings

to the wrong detail and suddenly the whole thing springs

a leak,

devontae. i shouldve clocked devontae.

older, sixteen, ran with the kids from burnside who stayed

out past midnight making decisions that decayed

their futures in real time and devontae had displayed

a specific interest in amara that shed waylaid

politely, then firmly and I was the thing that betrayed

his patience or so the story goes, the tirade

of male ego dressed in the language of the block, the charade

of respect when what it really was was, afraid

of losing something he never had, retrograde

possession and I didnt know the depth of what Id wade

d into standing at 161st with a book

marcus called me friday at 9PM

Marcus: "yo where you at?"

Me: "walking to meet amara by the park"

Marcus:" Which park?"

Me: "franz sigel. she said she wanted to walk"

Marcus: "jonah. listen to me. who told you to meet at franz sigel after dark?"

Me: "She texted me"

Marcus: "Did she call you?"

Me: "no she-"

Marcus: "Jonah call her right now"

Me: "marcus what are you-"

Marcus: "call her. right now while im on the phone. do it.

amara: "hello?"

Me: "hey, were you-, did you text me to meet at franz sigel?

Amara: "what? no. im at my cousins in yonkers, I texted you like an hour ago that I couldn't come out tonight, you didn't see it?"

Me: "I-"

Marcus: "dont go to that park, bro. dont go. turn around right now."

Me: "how did you-"

Marcus: "devontaes boy reef was in ramons bragging. they got your number from, i dont know how

just dont go-"

and I was already at the entrance to franz sigel

i was already there

and I turned around

and they were already behind me.

i dont remember all of it in sequence , the brain

does something with trauma, reorganizes the chain

of events into something survivable, the pain

arrives edited, what I remember, the refrain

of devontaes voice "you thought you was gonna maintain

out here with her? you thought you was built for this terrain?"

and the cold of the ground when I went down, the drain

of the sky above me, lil tjay still playing the same

song from the apartment window three floors up, the mundane

cruelty of the city continuing while the domain

of my specific body was under, and the rain

starting, february cold returning in march, the vein

of something ancient running through the borough, the contain-

ment of violence inside the ordinary, the explain-

able and unexplainable simultaneously, the main

thing I thought, on the ground, was "amara"

the main thing I thought was "the book"

the main thing I thought was "okafor."

architecture. load bearing. what holds.

i held.

i held.

i got three brothers. i should explain the architecture

darius is twenty two, works sanitation, the rector

of our household in the practical sense, the projector

of stability in a frame that needed it, protector

by nature, not performance, the collector

of every bill, every problem, every defector

from peace that arrived at our door, the inspector

of every person I brought around,

of bad energy before I could name it my director

when I couldnt direct myself

kofi is nineteen. different.

kofi is the one the block sees, significant

in the way the block measures significance, the brilliantine

cool of him, the way he moves, the discipline

of his reputation, guess kofi never raised his voice

in my memory, not once, just the choice

he presents you with by existing, the poise

of someone who knows what theyre capable of, the noise

he doesnt make is louder than what most people deploy

and then theres marcus. not blood. but.

they came to the hospital separately

darius first, he sat down, looked at my face

didnt say anything for a full minute

then said "you know who?"

I said "devontae. burnside."

he nodded once. stood up. left.

kofi came in after. looked at me.

said "you good?"

I said "yeah."

he said "okay."

he left.

i dont know exactly what happened saturday night

and im not going to pretend I do, the right

to that story belongs to the people who were in it and the light

i have is secondhand, what I know, by the slight

of monday morning, devontae from burnside had a different profile

on the block the kind of profile that required a lifestyle

adjustment, the kind of message the bronx sends meanwhile

in the language the bronx speaks when words arent worth the trial

darius came home sunday quiet, ate dinner, said grace

marcus had a busted knuckle and a look on his face

of someone whod located something in himself and placed

it back where it belonged, kofi was kofi, erased

of evidence, present and accounted for, his case

resting permanently in the unspoken, the space

between what happened and what gets said, the grace

of the Bronx when it handles its own, the embrace

that dont look like an embrace to anyone outside the place