To take advantage of the January thaw, I walk
uptown to savor the grapefruits and green
peppers in the winter light, then, returning, turn
the corner to see the aftermath of a slap,
a lover’s quarrel perhaps, no, nearing the red-headed woman who is crying,
and three, four, five, or six
gathering bystanders,
it’s clear that wasn’t the case.
“I wasn’t doing anything,” she says
between her tears and the fiercely red
right side of her face,
“she just came up to me and hit me.”
“Who her, that one?”—the woman, girl?
strutting down the block and as we stare
at her back turning on her heel as if
she overheard.