Traffic slows at 24th & Q
where the Latino boys
flirt with simple white girls
but never take them home
We slide in on platform shoes
skirts waving
perspiration slicking our thighs
cement so hot you taste it
The Stockyard breeze muscles in
all rolled up sleeves
on the backs of ten million cattle
some break free, leap fences
charge down shotgun streets
moon eyed and heavy faces
Polish housewives and thick necked
husbands shout hey, hey
and whistle from their doorways
cowboys cut rope, drag them back
the wildest ones shot dead
the others lined up waiting
But, we are sixteen
the earth shimmies as we walk
some break free, some bleed out
Writing 