As kids, they would listen to the radio,
Tune it to the channel black boys from the city
Should not have
Been able to find. He fiddled and fumbled
with that dial, the elicit channel a portal
To another side
Of guns and fists and a frequency of clicks.
Their ears filled with police whispers
Under porch lights,
Listening until they learned how to be alive,
How to stay alive, inside a muted muzzle
Of soft static.
Rosa Canales is a recent graduate of Denison University. Her work has appeared in Capsule Stories, Lammergeier, perhappened mag, and the Sigma Tau Delta Review.
