Call

I write in second person in general. Just so you know. This one felt different though.

That has to be him. It's his back.

The way his hair stands up just at the crown and he never shaves his neck except for when he goes to the barber.

Call him.

            Call.

                        Call his name.

You yell it, those two syllables like fire on your tongue from three blocks away. Make sure he hears you. Feels the heat.

But he doesn't turn.

Call again.

His name.

The man just walks on down the block. Even pace. No twitches when you call out.

Again. For a third time.

What man wears a purple coat anyway? On a Sunday.

With a damn blackbird.

Raven.

Ravens and Poe.

Poe was from Baltimore.

He was from Dallas. Couldn't of been him.

Pull out from your wide knowledge of literature and your short knowledge of sports.

Definitely wasn't him.

Poe is Baltimore.

Dallas must be something else.

Must not be him.

Reach and try to find him.

On a street corner where he's never be in the middle of the day on a Sunday. 

In a city he wouldn't go to.

In this heat.

See him at a café on Boulder, a blank billboard around the corner from your market. At the door when the UPS guy drops off the mail.

Always it must be him.

Call him.

            Call. Call his name.