Neighborhood Violence We Never Talk About

Neighborhood Violence We Never Talk About

BY Ingrid Andersson

Neighborhood Violence We Never Talk About
(dropping my child at school)

Streets as wide as landing-strips.
Sidewalks never laid.
Cars at stop signs over-running zebra stripes.
Pedestrians scattering like prey.
My son’s locked school.
No guns allowed (a sign on his way into 6th-grade).
Weedless playgrounds.
Weedless lawns.
Unswimmable blue-green lake.
The ghost-white bicycle where a boy was killed.
The Starbucks barrista: Have a good day!
Re-entering morning traffic under
another flooding rain.