Crown Heights Vignette

by Genevieve Betts

Jerk meat and roti, cow skin and goat feet,
neighbors in curlers outside the laundry gossiping,

children chicken dancing at cops driving by,
all sharp elbows, clucks, and emboldened eyes,

my bodega on Rogers and Montgomery Street,
its cat and her kittens in the back, mewling,

Chinese deliverymen zipping around senior citizens—
dominos, spliffs, arguing, Jamaican accents,

ships bellowing and seagulls bomb diving
trash bags that super’s stack against the […]