X-Post from the Lounge: The BlueIris Semi-Nightly Poetry Break, 1/15/08

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=105&topic_id=7354182&mesg_id=7354182

"Family Reunion at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Birth Home"

It is so small, so like a normal house. It
could be a place we pass most every day
at home, not a great man's house.

We search the living room, the kitchen
the upstairs bedrooms, all perfectly preserved,
for some sign. The Dreamer's genesis

a starting point for his journey down
Sweet Auburn to the Mountaintop—
and back: the marble tomb, eternal flame,
the quiet reflecting waters down the street.

We line up across the porch for
a photograph, a cluster near the stairs:
grands, great grands, cousins,
nephews, nieces. All pause and gather at this
touchstone for the world so ordinary, so grand.

A German tourist points and clicks.

A black man, his Asian wife,
their children, wait to be next.

Above us a child peeks from
an upstairs window. Waves.
Points to the horizon.

The cameras flash.

—Reginald Harris