I never know
a			moment 
	this way
				comes.
				




Sitting in a barber shop
on Hester St. in New York's Chinatown,
the plastic seat swivels,
the electric razor buzzes
and reggae sweetens the air
as I drift back twenty years
to a picket line at Maimonides Hospital
where I had never been assigned before.
I expect violence, but find instead
workers walking the picket line to the tune of 
reggae on the boombox on the sidewalk
and I dance the line, too.

All my life, looking for a place to fit and
suddenly - "Hey look at our mon, dancing!" and
bopping up and down, round and round,
the whole shift.  
Never assigned there again.


I never know
a			moment
	this way
				comes.


			Brandywine
			2/1/99