The Rhythm from my porch
Tire low of air, flap, flap, flap…does the driver realize he’s almost
on the rim?
A ball game played in my neighbor’s yard…I’m half asleep on the porch,
listening to a metal clang…the bat? A metal plate used as a base? The rhythm
plays like music in its own way. I recognize Mario’s echoing laughter, and I
smile…laughter with a real, a full joy in it. I hear Jose’s voice…a rather
humorous lilt in how he makes his pronouncements…
A group of wrens, massed around
a ‘puddle’ of seeds fallen from a tree; they move almost as one, from the
driveway apron to the drive, and then to the lilac bushes, flowers shed so long
ago. As if prompted by the influx of wrens, a cardinal bursts from the bushes
to a neighboring tree...one rhythmic note affecting the other.
“F….him, I said, mother f’er….”, I heard the words, followed by laughter, words I
can’t understand – is it a dialect, is it lazy speech, is it just that I don’t
want to hear it…my cold eyes hold no power if the speakers don’t make eye contact
with me. The raw, unwelcomed cursing is oddly rhythmic…its own music…is it?
Slap, slap, slap; rap, rap, rap; basketballs and rap music, both
hitting the sidewalk. Rhythmic, too, are the glances….”Don’t look, Sage’ my 12
year old neighbor whispers to me. He’s Blood; don’t look.’ This, too, is a
warning oft repeated to me. He’s Crypt, he’s Blood, He’s an 18…don’t do it,
Sage.
You’re gay; am not; sure you are; laughter; some tension; the message
not spoken now reveals who has been ripping on who today. You are, so I’m not.
A day’s rhythm is coming to its end on the porch. Kids are gathering, feeling safe to say what
they wouldn’t on the street. We talk about ‘gay’. “You’ve met my son; he’s gay.
You like him. You respect him. What’s different?
Karen boys bike by; chattering in a language we don’t understand. Marco
mocks the unknown under his breath. Hey, I tell him, how was it when you came
here and didn’t speak English? Did people mock your Spanish? How did you feel?
The form of our conversation takes up a familiar rhythm, we’ve had it before
about Hmong language and culture. It’s a rhythm that becomes, sadly, almost
comfortable.
Weed wackers, lawn mowers, people calling to each other. Motors
revving, missing mufflers, roaring motorcycles; planes in a no-fly zone,
dismiss any shred of conversation. Wait.
A scooter’s whirrrrrr; a Rainbow shopping cart, rumbles down the hill,
child propelling child; in the background a car horn out of control, but in
perfect rhythm.
And then, one Saturday morning, the world regains briefly, the rhythm
of only birds, the sipping of early morning coffee, and the quiet turning of a
book’s pages. I’m alone with my own rhythm.
9/2011
