Subways rattle overhead; long corners scream the voice of metal. Below, a street fills with faces. Anxious gazes, newspaper readers, nervous feet, fingers tap, hats tilt; waiting for bus #58. Warm city breezes swirl, painting faces gray and humid. Sweat stains armpits. Foreheads glaze like thin frosting. Collars breath unbuttoned. Sleeves roll up tight. Tiredly … More BUS #58
Between dusk and light half truths and minced oaths lift from lips sentences of thought salted in hope the understanding breaking wisdom where abandoned chances release onto sidewalks unnoticed passed over as common babbling taken for granted a bruising for speech from the wandering wise without pillows standing, spreading neon flashes of mercurial thoughts. … More STREET WISE
The brownstone building rises high at the corner. Cornucopia edges run to the corners where fierce concrete gargoyles with mottled teeth repel invisible spirits. Open windows welcome city air. Curtains run ripples on the side. Half pulled shades flutter. Pigeons circle overhead, landing noisily on the ledge. The elderly gather in packs on … More BROWNSTONE
The veil of youth is a door, or many doors where summer flourished all year in warmth. Games were fields of testing strength and speed, fight and spit. We possessed joints of steel and muscles with stretch; no mountain was too great. Arms were machines and legs springboards. The soul laughed at death and scorned … More YOUTH
Fragile answers lay loosely scattered, like after storm clouds where prayers slip through and hope abounds. Your voice of thoughts conquers the silence with flavored aromas of gladness remembered. You try to chart out tomorrow and fill in the blanks; steady the course to find a way. The linen of forgiveness is … More RENEWING
Determined eyes. Chiseled granite. Men full of strength. Sycamore trees with arms; skin of mules and rigid steeled hands. Their youth bottle necked with fights and chain link fence. Clapboard shacks leaned with time. Clothes were coal smoke soaked. Dust was the life of everything. It was a place of bold brassy men with beer … More THE OTHER SIDE
The piano man got no shake for hurrying those fingers working notes jump walls like thieves stretching long to escape. Hungry air yields like trees caught in storms tilting hard roulette sound got no stop when spinning into jazz up and out.
The music released with a slow gravity against the weight of a dusky room. The record player, a wooden box with antique charm, scratched out a song of weeping blues as the needle traveled the grooves, circling, advancing, calling for hands to clap and feet to walk lightly. The music penetrated the gray of morning … More NEW DAY
A coronet sounds fresh into air like rain from a troubled sky, slipping sharp past an open apartment window, past jealous earthbound curtains, chipped paint and neglected flowers, over a fire escape where the fluid of sound tumbles down metal stairs past girls smoking cigarettes and snapping gum crossing corners where garbage cans stink of … More REACHING
A river of stairs high above in a galaxy of streams beyond the reach of tearful upturned eyes fails to provoke an affect on order or direction within the heavens. Shadowed gray night images slip between fences and past angry sleeping dogs while pleadings and unanswered prayers attract angels waiting for words that act … More UPTURNED
Roger Singer 