The Street

At night the staccato of gunfire
and the whine of sirens
reverberate down the street.

The next day, everyone ignores
POLICE LINE–DO NOT CROSS.

People pass by and jump over
the chalk silhouette of the body
with the nonchalance of playing hopscotch.

Children skip rope and have a tug-of-war
with discarded crime scene tape.

Drugs? Robbery?
Or just the punctuation
to an exchange of words?

Irrelevant questions
of cause and effect.

People here only know rust red
blood stains on concrete fade
to gray when washed with bleach.