Atlanta, 1955

Esther, John, Carol, David

Atlanta, 1955

The whistle — descending third — meant home.
How wonderfully far that familiar sound
traveled at dusk to children bicycling round
suburban streets yellow with ragweed bloom.
Tonto, Geronimo, wannabe hounds of hell
played hide & seek in half-built houses
pressing on pastures of last-chance cows
fated to fuel Atlanta’s urban swell.
Up to the school, down to the pond, a zoom
around a corner to the corner store
where no one had coins so our gang
leader stole. We seemed impossibly far
when dinnertime tolled & pronto — hunger pangs.
Oh! There were mothers, whistling us home.