The city heat back then!—
clinging to streets and passersby
like a haze of guilt,
swirling over the Potomac
and returning with the smell
of Watergate and a slow current—
this photograph on my kitchen wall
freezes all that—
narrowing everything down to the cook,
a black man enclosed
in white grainy smoke,
his head bowed toward the BBQ grill.
Beyond him, white college students
stare limply into my kitchen.
The carver is the one element
yearning to spin out of my frame,
shuffling, turning
like a slow-spinning coin
between the grills,
reaching out for stacks of ribs,
silent.
Published in Potomac Review, Summer 2001
©Beth Partin 2001. All rights reserved.
