Melissa Prunty Kemp

Atlanta Georgia is a needle in my vein.
When I leave it and drive back across the Georgia line
I get that heroine fade, sucking up the high of the
ley lines, slave blood and pain grown into
capitalist political power and wealth
recognized in the world, international.
I speed down I85 south, pushing the generous 70 to 85,
weaving in the lane, rollin’ out like we do,
rushing to get to the traffic jam there at all hours
on the road wide enough to land a prop plane
at 5 pm and not flatten the Mercedes and Lexuses
that pave the road.
 
Creeks sew up Glenwood to Candler to Decatur,
swamps in a city, Lithonia and Columbia Dr,
mud decay perfect for body disposal, for Atlanta
children murdered or the rival ball player.
The children skip down the street and slide themselves
through the fence railings, a shortcut.
Like leaves on trees that never fall the question hangs
Will they make it home?
 
A 100 square mile city in a forest, concrete patches
compete with kudzu jungles and Virginia Creeper
that grow into dark hovels, hide the homeless
piles of dirty clothes, plastic capless liquor pints, syringes.
 
Redbuds and forsythia bloom in February
black and red-shot orioles spread weed seeds like banners,
severe thunderstorms, tornados, roiling clouds,
baseballs of hail announce spring high season.
Time for Mother Nature’s murders and free concerts
in Piedmont and Centennial Park after the spring floods
pollen rivers and bits of paper rush to clog storm drains,
make lakes on asphalt, fill potholes, capture suspensions.
 
Tourists from Iowa and Detroit descend. Ballplayer fans
scan corners for ticket scalpers, narrowly leave
baseball bacchanal with their lives, but they won’t leave
this Dirty South with their money.  Phillips Arena
megatron mesmerizes them in the scene, a regular day.
They are taken at gun point to the ATM, their money
srained away like the blood that leaks from throat slit,
tourist left inside a kudzu patch.
 
Syncopated bass beats, djun djuns and djembes in a park,
thumping, bass guitars waltz from apartment or car windows

pirouette, a competition, young indigenous against the Mother Land.
 
Atlanta City Municipal Court, meeting place for so many Atlantans,
mixers of 18 year old traffic ticket holders who will become owned
by the court for the next six months if they’re lucky. Fortune 500 employees
suited and late to work, lucky as always, their ordeal will be less.
They’ll pay a fine and the City. She will act like nothing ever happened,
if their debit card works. If not, they will find another means, break into
line because they already waited 20 minutes. Of course the nameless worthless

will let me cut in line into the lives of the people behind you.

Blackberry Africans require incessant explanations, offer “Please Ma’am . . . “
and excuses, “court was at 10 on my receipt” when we all know
Court always starts at 8.  Line breakers. Rule breakers. Always asking
for exception.