He is that friend who presents a book we’ve never seen
wrapped in soft tissue like a gift from the divine,

which it is, in a way, coming from the long-gone pen
of Langston Hughes, jazz poet of 1920s Harlem:

“We build our temples for tomorrow, strong as we know how,
and we stand on top of the mountain free within ourselves.”

In the book Hughes spools out a story to accompany
Roy DeCarava’s photos of African Americans in 1950s Harlem:

“But almost everywhere there is something to set on or lean on,”
someone is setting or leaning. In what few parks there is,

some just set on a park bench… and hold their hands.”
And there on the page are a pair of dark clasped hands

contrasting with those hands’ white nail beds,
the kind of photo our friend might make,

whether the hands belong to the famous, the wealthy,
the common man, the dying. And we read the small book,

touched by the fiction of the real people in the photos,
whose protagonist, Miss Mary, says, “I done got my feet

caught in the flypaper of life—and I’ll be dogged
if I want to get loose.” And that, too, is our friend,

snagged by the sticky flypaper of life and loving
every bit—even the heart-tugging sorrows of it—

this poet photographer content to set on a park bench
and lean in to a stranger whose hands jitterbug

their way through a story, our friend the listener
nodding and smiling, uttering the kindest prayer:

“Tell me more.”

•••

For Genaro Molina, with our thanks for the present of your presence,
as well as the book, “The Sweet Flypaper of Life” by Langston Hughes
and Roy DeCarava.