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Mira Coleman

Lionel used to work 

the railroad, a porter or a captain

in the days of dining cars,

but here now in this courthouse,

meeting defendants with a porter’s grace

dressed in a vest with a fob and

watch, here long

before crack and robber boys

came when parish priests ruled the streets with

fear,  an African Methodist in a Catholic land

of venial and mortal sin, his eyes

flashing at the old judge

whose black robe reeks of sweat

from a thousand days

of juveniles’ trials

in fetid courtrooms with

faded grandeur

where the bailiffs stand muscled

all day at the leathery doors that swing in

to let people in and swing away 

to keep them out, both,

preserving

the anguished hush

that begins each morning

and stretches to afternoon

when the men who are going

to city jail are transported,

their gaunt angry wives leaving

to go home; clutching cheap purses

full of aches and crosswords

out the swinging doors, below the peeling arc

of ceiling, past the policemen on overtime

who sit without hope on the witness bench

holding bolt cutters

and handguns

in evidence bags.

Lionel is there at the end of the day,

like he is working a train, guiding riders on

and off, hoisting baggage to an upper rack,

walking aisles with train legs so he

does not fall in the rough wobble of railbed,

checking his watch and watching the

track.