Corner Sermons

somebody on the stoop preachin' at sunrise,
hands like currency counting the day in nickels,
mama's coffee burned but she sips it proud—
that bitter better than the silence of empty pockets.
we move through the city like saved prayers,
feet slick on subway grease, elbow-to-elbow sermons
spoken in the language of knocks on wood,
of dominoes clacking like church bells in basements.

hear: the corner store radio is a prophet
selling yesterday's hits for fifty cents a soul.
kids kicktin' a can, inventing futures in the cracks,
while a junked sedan coughs its last gospel down the block.
sirens are hymns we learn to sleep through,
and moonlight looks like a streetlamp's promise:
flicker, hold, maybe tonight.

we code-switch with the seasons—
talk soft with landlords, loud with kin,
sayin' "on God" to the sky and "it's cool" to fear.
there's poetry in the way the laundromat hums,
metal drums beating rhythm like heart chambers,
quarters clink like distant medals for surviving noon
and midnight both. the barber trims more than hair,
he trims shame, trims the bad angles out of your name.

my cousin counts receipts and ancestors alike,
adds up small victories with a pencil that breaks.
grandma patches sleeves and hope with equal thrift,
her needle tighter than bank interest.
we hustle in the margin where cash meets prayer,
folding faith into takeout boxes—leftover resilience
served with hot sauce and a side of grit.

love here wears work boots and sometimes sandals,
it is highfive after a funeral, casserole in tin,
it's a lullaby hummed over the rumble of fridge motors.
we inherit traffic and tenement shadows,
but we also inherit a map—no compass needed—
drawn in lipstick and chalk, in tire tracks and rumor.

so when the city whispers danger, we whisper louder:
remember the hands that pulled you up, the songs that kept you walking.
we are not monuments; we are movement—
a congregation of footsteps, of laughter that snaps
like fresh gum, sticky with sweetness and fight.
this is how we pray: by breathing, by stepping, by returning
to the corner every morning to give the street its sermon.