My Neighbor From the Ghetto

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My neighbor from the ghetto raps at my temples

Just like then, when a swarm of blonde locusts

invaded my mother city

and mowed it down:

“Oh my dear brother, life is of no importance to me,

what I want is to survive, that is everything.”

Now, as my temples tap out that same verse, already

for the umpteenth time, ever more mysteriously

what was said demands its due within me:

To survive.

Of course, I also wanted to survive,

I wanted, and still want to survive.

To survive — what sort of thing and whom?

To survive terror? To survive

some someone who shows unkindness to me?

And perhaps to survive death altogether?

It seems very little, seems very little …