tribute to-j. rodriguez

if you're going to be a street poet
make sure you have lots of friends
who drink fight steal or sell drugs
they will always have problems
with the law, and you can write
poems about them

make sure one of them is a bonafide crackhead
coke head, dope fiend, they are sure to
take a really bad hit or a really good
hit and die, and then you can write a
poem about it

get a light-skinned girl from Y-O
or long island to fall in love with you.ask
her, occasionally, for her opinion on your
friends and your poetry. more than likely
she'll say something really naive. that's
how you know
you are on the right track

meanwhile, get a loud, brown girl
from around the way to have your baby
and then break up with her
she will quite possibly stress you
whenever she can. should the street
muse ever fail to keep its appointment
with you, you can call your baby
mam and ask why she hasn't
let you see your child. she will
immediately go into single strong
independent brown mother woman
mode and go off on you. this
will make you regret calling her, but then again
you have another poem to write about

your child will grow up hating
you for being a sperm donor
good for happy meals and may
be next times, twenty six weekends
a year-instead of being a
live in dad like the ones you see on TV
you will forget his/her birthday
and sometimes his/her age, and
otherwise break his/her heart
you'll be able to write poems about that as well

keep odd hours, making sure to walk
into you parents' home menacingly
sunday mornings, until you find sudden
travel bags filled with your briefs
this will allow you to spend more time
at your friend's house on rooftops park benches
subways and other spots where you can
further develop you street poet resume
as well as you i.q
and of course, write more street poems

but thats cool because you can tell
your friends about all the street memoirs
as you stand in front of the bodega
with an almost-like mom's dinner from
the caridad playing dominoes
or as we say bones
with your friends who are still drinking fighting
stealing selling drugs unless they're in jail
in which case they're still drinking
fighting stealing selling drugs or dead
when the bodega closes, ending the game
you will make one final trip to the liquor store
next door to the bodega and buy
rum from an island you've never known
in order to feel like you belong there and
drag yourself to your solitary apartment
to pass out to wake up the next day with
a serious hangover and still another street poem