Free Sunset

On the corner of 40th and Opal in Oakland is a gorgeous mural painted by the amazing Kristi Holohan honoring my poem "Free Sunset." It's been up for months but I'm only now posting it here and for the first time with the complete text of the poem. It was originally part of the project Temescal InSitu.

Free Sunset

Lift my chin to the clouds, the heavens, the clouds

And wish or pray to wish for rain

To wash out the silence, the silence

He left me, behind the noise of highways

And trains at the intersection of 40th and Telegraph.

Dirty foot walks the broken streets

Dirty street breaks the feet of boys without socks

Boys without socks or gone to jail:

Boys without sunsets.

Boys with sunsets on the other side of the wall.

Broken sidewalks. Broken hearts.

Broken hearts.

Sunsets are free, he says

Once again outside my paid-for window

Sunsets are free

Behind the lines, a steeple, the lines

Once again paid for, this view

This view all the better on the hill

Outside the walls where children know death

More death than I

Ever will.

Walls between free sunsets and children not free

Children already gone

Past my share of grieving

And yours.

Your sunset's free, he says.

Meg Claudel