the pulse (part 2)

(spoken word poem. part two of the pulse)

Charleston,
where church steeples and cranes look over us
and multi-colored houses
house live-in servants.
where fast-rising hotels
rise above slow-moving clouds
that cast floods on the corner
of America Street.
where parades of one color
get one day to celebrate
then hide in the shadows of gentrification.

The Holy City,
where the steady beat of jazz
is the beat of our streets
and the dialect of our past
writes future conversations.
where bridges and bike lanes
break bread with politics,
while progressives preach peace
with uneducated tongues.

The Angel Oak tree is young
compared to our vanity,
where $16 burgers are in the middle of a food dessert
while every community wants a piece of the pie.

And grandmothers sit on porches,
watching us change
while the problems of our city
remain the same.

We live
in Charleston.