Becoming a Statue

You walk down the street 
drinking your $7 cold press juice

on your way to making art.

You move against the tide of frail and elderly,

as a faceless other: brown body in foreign lands.

Reaching the corner there is a trash can

with two gravid women waiting for the light. 

You toss the empty into the receptacle.

It does not clang or bang against the can.

The cup makes the usual soft cut of styrofoam

against plastic bag lining. 

One of the women jumps and yelps.

Startle reflex makes her snatch her bag

closer to her chest as a shield.

Her companion looks confused about

the momentary commotion,

until you see her come into awakening

about the brown body moving down the street.

The startled woman quickly looks away

as the friend continues to piece together 

the scene they will pretend never happened.

You continue toward your destination,

sure to avoid eye contact

and hoping not to startle any old white ladies,

you walk slower and softer until

your arms are molded extensions
of a park statue.

Is this your art for the day:

to exist against their screams,

their startles and clutched purses?

When you arrive in poetry class,

the teacher asks you to read something

and you recite a page about Baltimore

and what it means to be seen as packs,

gaggles, flocks, prides, a posse of

Huns, mongrels, assassins, Zulus.

Afterward there is a vacuum that's filled by

a stuttering student: he is nervous that 

the conversation might become political.

That would make him uncomfortable.

You watch as his words tumble

out of his twisted mouth. 

The room recoils back into mute.

The teacher waits for any other opinion

but the room is voting with their silence:

they want to move on to another writer.

The poem read after your's is funny and light.

It settles into the void nicely.

The students laugh and breathe again. 

You smile and fold up your paper. ​
Your lips concretize. 
Stiff neck, vacant eyes.