SUMMER COMES TO BREWSTER PLACE

(after reading The Women of Brewster Place)

The dark-skinned black-eyed women

Live and love

In the walled street of Brewster Place

Abandoned, often bereft,

their mother-natures nurture

both good and bad

Tears are seldom seen

or even shed

but anger slowly rising

spills over like water

when the tap is turned

and left

In the relentless heated hours

along Brewster Place

hope slowly rots

like the discarded apple cores

at the open doorways

Or, conversely, swells

in pregnant ballooning ways

Life in ebb and flow,

washes through the bricks

of Brewster Place

its blood pulse:

Day    night    night     day

When the sun, heat-heavy

hovering, finally sets

and darkness descends

on Brewster Place