Three little girls walking
down Piedmont Avenue,
holding hands
fairy princesses
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fast friends.
Everyone loves everyone.
It takes a village.

Later, on the bus,
a mother
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yells at her five year old who
is too excited about what he sees
out the window.
"Sit down! Shut up!"

My car is broken down
again.
I’m broke too.
The man
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who comes out of the alley to help
can’t get it started either.

He gives me twenty dollars
for cab fare home.

In the grocery store,
a woman
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tells her daughter
not to talk to
mine.
Young men selling bean pies
outside the Safeway
won’t even look at me.