BARBARA TRAMONTE
BROOKLYN
I am here
Electrified
Okay, lit up
But I come as
A griot
To tell you a tale
Of recollection
On a hot summer street
Brooklyn street
Heat from concrete rose
From underneath
I was a tadpole
A frog, a snake
A flytrap for cotton candy
A caramel
With the widest mouth
That was me
Ramona and Pippi
And Nancy Drew
I was dancing down the street
I had a bandanna
A fake horse and
The wind beneath me
You let me wander those streets so young
Those streets made me, built me
You let me know the world
The bakery, the kittens
The scary neighbors
The smelly ones
The synagogue
The street games
The cherry pits
The chairs
That folded.
BARBARA TRAMONTE: I worked as a professor in the school for graduate studies at SUNY Empire State College for many years and have worked as a poet-in-the-schools in New York City for a decade. I formerly owned a children’s bookstore in Brooklyn Heights, NY. I have had one book of poems published by a small press, and a chapbook published (2018) by Finishing Line Press.