There are no songs in my neighborhood.
No curbside singers.
No front stoop strummers.
No back porch drummers.
No rhymes or rhythms rising
out of cracks in the sidewalk like lyrical weeds.
No guy down the street with bongos serenading the moon
or the same guy with congas greeting the sun.
Music is a private affair in my neighborhood.
The birds in my neighborhood hear no neighborhood song.
My neighborhood is window-glass-white, no colored sound..
If you want music in my neighborhood
you have to provide your own.
turn on the radio, play a cd, or click on the color tv.
The maintenance of civil silence.
And it’s a good thing we do.
We don’t all have the same taste in music.
Some are pleased by Pavarotti, others by Elvis.
Both are dead.
But their vibrating voices live electronically on.
My neighbor died. I never heard her sing her song.