The Crossing
Are you all right?
Mom asks in her school girl voice.
He lies there motionless, face down;
We stare wordless.
The streetlight illuminates Triumph
and the darkness couldn’t hold him.
With neither a smile nor a frown he stands.
‘Sokay, I’m all right and touches my cap.
You’re lucky, Mom murmurs.
He kick starts his bike, like a lover’s quarrel.
We were in the crosswalk, I contend, while
The bearded man, his muffler bubbling, takes off.
JACK CHAVOOR, born and raised in Burbank, California, currently resides in Fresno, California where he is an English teacher at Roosevelt High School. He considers writing a form of therapy. He has written over 200 autobiographical vignettes and three poems, one of which he cannot find. He is married to Grace, a remarkable woman and descendant of a Babylonian Queen. They have three amazing children and one angelic granddaughter.
