Posted by freeleonardpeltier at bgp01113894bgs.westln01.mi.comcast.net on July 20, 2003 at 22:34:33:
This is a poem by Patrick Rosal from Jersey, just read his first book and it is one of the greatest things i've read in a long time. This isn't my fav poem he wrote, just the first one I read. Also if anyone else knows any good poets I would like to hear about them. Enjoy
B-Boy Infinitives:
To suck until our lips turned blue
the last drops of cool juice
from a crumpled cup sopped
with spit the first Italian Ice of summer
To chase posicle stick skiffs
along the curb skimming stormwater
from Woodbridge Ave. to Old Post Road
To be To B-boy To be boys who
snuck into a garden to pluck
a baseball from mud and shit
To hop that old man's fence before
he burst through his front door
with a lame-bull limp charge
and the fist the size of a half spade
To be To B-boy to lace shell-toe Adidas
To say word to Kurtis Blow
To laugh in the afternoons
someone's mama was so black
when she stepped out of the car
the oil light went on
To count hairs sprouting
around our cocks To touch
ourselves To pick the half-smoked
True Blues from my father's ashtray
and cough the gray grit
into my hands To run
my tounge along the lips of a girl
with crooked teeth To be
To B-boy To be boys for the ten day's
an 8-foot gash of cardboard lasts
after we dragged it
seven blocks then slapped it
on the cracked blacktop To spin
on our hands and backs To bruise
elbows wrists and hips To Bronx-Twist
Jersey version beside the mid-day traffic
To swipe To pop To lock freeze and
drop dimes on the hot pavement-
even if the girls stopped watching
and the street lamps buzzed all
night we danced like that
and no noe called us home