there’s a blind black man on the corner
and my mama hates him so
she scowls into each window
that she ever sees him through
on those rare days when we pass
him by on the corner of the street
she always pulls me closer
and quickens her red-heeled feet
’cause what my mama thinks is
that he’s ruining my life
because he can’t find a home here
or a rich white woman wife
and there’s just this poor old black man
with no eyes to stare us down
no eyes to see my young face shadowed
by my mama’s ruby frown
so I wonder what he thinks now
when he hears us walk the other way
if he can see my mama
or just the prejudice that remains