1. On the Subway by Sharon Olds



      On the Subway by Sharon Olds
       
                       
      The boy and I face each other.
      His feet are huge, in black sneakers
      laced with white in a complex pattern like a
      a set of intentional scars. We are stuck on
      opposite sides of the car, a couple of
      molecules stuck in a rod of light
      rapidly moving through darkness. He has the
      casual cold look of a mugger,
      alert under hooded lids. He is wearing
      red, like the inside of the body
      exposed. I am wearing dark fur, the
      whole skin of an animal taken and
      used. I look at his raw face,
      he looks at my fur coat, and I didn't
      know if I am in his power-
      he could take my coat so easily, my
      briefcase, my life-
      of if he is in my power, the way I am
      living off his life, eating the steak
      he does not eat, as if I am taking
      the food from his mouth. And he is black
      and I am white, and without meaning or
      trying to I must profit from his darkness,
      the way he absorbs the murderous beams of the
      nation's heart, as black cotton
      absorbs the heat of the sun and holds it. There is
      no way to know how easy this
      white skin makes my life, this
      life he could take so easily and
      break across his knee like a stick the way
      his own back is being broken, the
      rob of his soul that at birth was dark and
      fluid and rich as the heart of a seedling
      ready to thrust up into any available light.
       
      http://www.mrbauld.com/oldspoems.html
       
       

      Back to top