This city is an elder.
Her skin is cracked with crows’ feet,
her teeth are turning brown,
the vibrato in her voice
croaks out
a heavy velvet sound.
She still wears rusted brick,
colonial lace around her collar,
her nails are painted murals bright
to add a light
to squalor.
Her hair: a leafy afro
sprouting ringlets from her brain,
her veins the winding highways stained with
drip tattoos of dirt and rain.
I love to watch her wrinkle,
I love to watch her grey.
Unlike those teenage glamour queens,
she has very much more
to say.
Carlyn Flint is a poet and playwright originally from Baltimore, Maryland who now teaches creative expression at a Title 1 elementary school in North Tulsa, Oklahoma. Her work with children informs her writing and fuels her to be socially conscious with whatever she creates.
Makes me want go to and get to know Baltimore. Way to express yourself so elequently and capture attention, Carly. Beautiful.
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What a lovely word painting of a city with many flavors.
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