Moonwalking, page 1
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for those
who know that
all land is one land
under the sea
—Z.E.
To Jonah and Reed
—L.M.L.
PIE
NIGHT FLIGHT
I
Dad says the bank owns our house now.
He hands me one box from the liquor store.
“Fill it with whatever you plan to take, JJ.
Leave everything else behind.
Don’t
tell
anyone.”
I have no one
to tell
and Dad
knows it.
II
Last summer we stood by the Nassau Expressway
which connected my home
Lynbrook, Long Island
and JFK airport
me and my dad
together
holding screen-printed signs
with the union bug
PATCO AIR TRAFFIC CONTROLLERS
his said
MY DADDY IS ON STRIKE
mine said.
Someone chucked an egg
that flew through exhaust-broiled air
and—splat!—broke across Dad’s knuckles
spilled its insides
all over his sign.
Why would they do this to us?
We were standing up for them.
I sucked back snot in my throat.
“Don’t you go crying, JJ,”
Dad said,
and I dared not in front of him
or his union brothers
even though
slowly hardening yolk
wiped out his P.
P for PATCO.
P for Pankowski.
P for our place in the world.
III
It took three days to break the strike.
Six months to realize
no place would
hire Dad
again.
They called it
blacklisted.
One year for us to go broke
with no one working.
Now Mom packs my clothes in a suitcase
summer tees and a winter coat.
This is not a vacation
but a trip back in time
a reversal
from Lynbrook
to Brooklyn
where Dad fled from Poland
with Babcia and Dziadek
when he was twelve.
IV
Wedged in the back seat
of Uncle Russell’s Toyota
(our car sold for cash
so the bank wouldn’t take it too)
we cross not oceans but highways.
I squeeze Mom’s hand
between boxes and suitcases.
Streetlamps flicker past
like summer’s fireflies
like a movie rewound.
An airplane screeches overhead
and zooms in for a landing
one of the night flights
that Dad used to help bring home.
Now we’re a night flight
fleeing our home in darkness …
V
In my box is:
Casio keyboard
Walkman
headphones
punk-rock cassettes
packed like a jigsaw puzzle
a Clash poster
zines
a red-and-white SOLIDARNOŚĆ banner
wrapped around The Chocolate War
to protect
the cover
fragile pages
me and Jerry
alone and bullied
Dad in mourning
the whole world
against us
Do I dare disturb the universe?
BOMB
rattle
rattle
rattle
hisssssssssssssssssss
till I met Ricky
I never knew mist
wrapped in metal could be
light as air and dark as night
or brighter than a neon sign
I shake the can and
the seed of a rainbow clatters
inside before blooming in my palm
and climbing across the wall
like the unruly roses in
Tito’s garden
here in the barrio
tags spread like wildfire
we write in code on concrete
words most folks can’t read
signs that wow
warn and
won’t be ignored
WE ARE HERE
you can’t erase us
you can close your eyes
or look away
try to scrub off the Sharpie
but we’ll just scratch our
names into glass
eternal
you can paint over our tags
but we won’t go away
we’ll just wait till night falls
and throw up another
BOMB
it’s all in the wrist
that’s what Ricky told me
hold the can loose
but press down hard on the nozzle
till the paint flows in a steady spray
Ricky let me watch and learn
as he bombed bodega walls
and storefront steel doors
we scaled fire escapes and
water towers protected by
height and the drama that
unfolds in the street at night
no one thinks to look up but
cops cruise down the block
so you gotta work fast
Ricky used to time me
till I could make a decent tag
in ten seconds or less
my name is Pierre but
it takes less time to
spray Pie on a wall
Ricky said I was too young
to join his crew but
he schooled me anyway
let me tag along unless
he was bombing the MTA
Ricky looked out for me
he was the only brother
I ever had and now he’s gone
a cross sprayed on the sidewalk marks
the spot where he got shot down
RIP RICKY
shot in the back at fifteen
shot walking away from a fight
just like he taught me to do
crews are still out here
battling
besting
busting the alphabet
breaking the law
bombing the bloque
with color so fresh
and styles so cold
can’t nobody hold us back
Mami tells me it’s wrong to
deface private property
like the buildings we tag
are clean as the Taj Mahal
ain’t no palaces round here
but Mami acts like a little paint
makes things worse than they
already are
she still stitches my name
on the tags of my clothes
but nothing in the ’hood
belongs to me or ever will
good, Mami says, then it
won’t be hard for you
to leave the barrio
this wasn’t meant to be
our home forever
but Mami’s plans fell through
once she had me and now
we’re stuck here until
I can find a way to
move us out
I need my own plan
Mateo joined the army
when he turned eighteen
and came home from Vietnam
without a scratch on him
but Tía Rosa still says it was
the war that killed my cousin
not the needle they found
in his arm
nobody dropped a
BOMB
on Williamsburg but
it still feels like a war zone out here
buildings burning crumbling boarded up
till the junkies move in and start doing their dirty deals
little kids shouldn’t have to see that mess
sometimes I get so mad I feel
like I’m about to explode
but Ms. Kirschbaum says
art is a weapon
art is a tool
art can be the balm that heals
all wounds
art won’t bring Ricky back
but Ms. K says a kid
not much older than me
half Puerto Rican / half Haitian
started out on the street
with a spray can in his hand
now SAMO© has his pieces
in galleries and magazines
he’s worldwide
legit
a real artist making bank
getting paid to do in a studio
what we do in the street for free
I want to know
is his mother proud of him
if I paint on canvas instead of concrete
will Mami smile at me again
will the line between her eyes disappear
will the voices in her head go away
I don’t want to let her down
when she’s got such high hopes for me
Pilar counts on me too so I can’t
afford to have a short fuse
I can’t detonate or implode
put my fist in somebody’s face
or catch a bullet in my back
for now I keep a can in my bag
and when my homework’s done
I go up on the roof to work
on the piece Ricky didn’t get to finish
maybe one day something I’ve made
will hang in a museum
but until I blow up
I’ll keep making throw-ups
so folks in my ‘hood can say
we knew him when …
rattle
rattle
rattle
hisssssssssssssssssss
THREE CHORDS
It’s half past midnight
when we pull up to the row house
back seat and trunk
stuffed with our things
but after we unload—
in silence, so neighbors won’t see
once proud union family
sneaking home
whipped, tails tucked—
a guitar and amp
remain next to the wheel well
the final item in Pandora’s box:
Hope.
It’s a Fender Telecaster
same guitar Joe Strummer
plays for the Clash
his spray-painted black
this one red and white
like the Polish flag
like the SOLIDARNOŚĆ banner
that hung on my wall
and protected my book
The Chocolate War.
“This was my first guitar, Joey.
Now it’s gonna be yours,”
Uncle Russell whispers
as Dad and Mom
talk with Babcia
in Dad’s old room
in this low-ceilinged basement flat
that stinks of wet carpet and bleach
and not-my-home.
He’s the only one who calls me Joey
and it sounds like joy
Uncle Russell not really my uncle
but a Cockney from East London
punk rock in his blood
union strong
the one who held the megaphone
when we stood at the Nassau Expressway
chanting, singing union songs
dodging taunts
and eggs
him most of all
the troublemaker
the ringleader
the foreigner in
President Reagan’s land.
Uncle Russell spends the rest of the night
teaching me three chords
in Babcia’s living room
the front room
where I’m supposed
to sleep
if I could sleep
C, D, G,
squeezing my fingertips into knife-sharp strings
his fingers calloused and rough.
“The more you practice
the tougher
your fingertips will get,”
he says.
My fingers trip over the strings
muffle the chords
release thuds instead of twangs
instead of a tune
a clang.
When I packed my Casio keyboard,
Mom said, “Leave it behind, JJ.
It’s a waste of space
and you can’t make noise
at your Babcia’s place.”
And I remember what
the piano teacher at my old school said,
“He won’t be the next Chopin,”
but I brought the keyboard anyway
and I’m practicing this guitar
till my fingers bleed
because in this punk zine
Sniffin’ Glue
one that I swiped
