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in the free chapbook
Challenge of Night and Day,
and Chicago Poems

by Michael Lee Johnson
(released 07/28/10) 		     hallenge of Night and Day, and Chicago Poems      Challenge of Night and Day, and Chicago Poems      you can also get this writing
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with either a Chicago day or Chicago night cover!
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Challenge of Night and Day,
and Chicago Poems
Order this writing in the 2010 poetry collection book

An Open Book		 An Open Book - 2010 poetry collection book click on the book cover
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South Chicago Night

Michael Lee Johnson (Version 2)

Night,
south Chicago is filled with drifters,
sugar rats, street walkers, pick-pockets and pimps,
a few whores on 95th street south
fill out the night agenda with silent whispers;
thousands of tiny fingers of greed snitch
dip into pockets other than their own.
The night air is full of insects and Lake Michigan perch smells.
Ladies diligent in the night,
High on the rise of condo balconies and drugs
Paint a picture, gesture to strangers on the streets
below, “do you want a date?”
The neon signs are blinking and half the bulbs
are burned out.
Mayor daily or is it Daley, is tucked in sleeping blankets tonight
in south Bridgeview; while most of the trouble lodges at the Salvation
Army where Christ lives with sinners.
Parents, despair. Surrender their children for
bucks and old silver coins traded earlier at the pawn shop;
some drink gut-rot sweet cherry wine and act as slave pushers-
but the children continue to roam the streets in designer clothing.
Before the warmth of morning sun, lips grin,
sidewalks fold turn up and open to foot traffic,
the city of Chicago trembles from the taste of delicious dew.
Just a map image and picture-frame shadow
of the city with the “big shoulders.”
Mayor Daily or is it Daley is sleeping and ducked away sound tonight.
The big city drifts, and in the morning light, sailboats
lean against the side walls of Lake Michigan sand and shoreline.



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