this mind of mine is harlem street 155,

its defining signs 

prying my kind to be fine for our time 

or our age as the stage time defines.

in july’s weeks harlem’s trees never freeze, 

which is so pretty, 

but so mean to you and me if our time were that tree. 

so we walk around to hop out of town

and believe that tree is our city. 

and its seeds are for bees 

and for artists with needs 

and it becomes fun to run to our breeze. 

its an apartment and a market 

and a stage for late plays 

that we never really leave. 

because to leave is to seize 

us as artists and needs 

and time’s very own chances to freeze. 

but, sad new jersey teen, that time is that tree.

the fire hydrants the right of these signs

have no choice but to understand you, 

for they, too, find what it’s like 

to be seen as a tired design.

you don’t understand when you go see a band 

and you stop since it’s not for your kind. 

but they design your mind to be fine all the time 

when you’ve only just finished grade nine.

guitar strings picked sound strict to you now 

when they once made the noise of pure joy. 

your own voice is a vintage tinted candle 

who bites its own bright light due to another’s dimmed freight. 

but your fire lights desire. 

when you eye your work with admire, 

you’re no longer so tired 

when realizing time is a liar.   

they say make yourself smaller to make yourself bigger, 

that smaller seam being what they swear you should wear 

to get better in the eyes of their very rare care. 

it’s not care, it’s their lie of our time.

you want back your blood those mosquitos sucked up, 

but you simply can’t make their new taste 

with no break to what’s yours like your brain and your shape. 

sad new yorker, they break us, but we renovate us. 

but, if you see harlem, can you tell it i miss it?

itself and its signs and its lies?

to the wee tree i eyed on street 155,

is this why we don’t believe in you and i?