Robber

In line at the courthouse on a bench
stretching the full length of a very
long hallway with lots of marble,
we waited to pay, to be heard.

Her baby toddled out of open hands
in shaky steps to the other wall
where he turned to smile at us,
humanity jammed up, staring ahead.

We were grown men, some fathers,
and we beamed back at him,
silly and wild in a moment.

We goo-gooed.
We smiled for him.
Well, some of us smiled.

We had expired tags.
Some of us had violated stop signs
in broad daylight.
We were the DWIs,
the speeders,
and in one way or another,
we'd all failed to yield some
right of way, so we came angry,
wishing to be anywhere else.
We came for mercy, we came without
because we were without.
We had nothing to pay for our crimes.

We smiled, knowing he'd be on this
bench one day farther on.
We smiled for all he didn't know yet,
but he smiled with all we'd forgotten.
And for a moment we put down our
anger, infractions and disregard
and our faces took up something
honest and out of our deep guts.

That kid jimmied our lock boxes,
and nabbed something tender
and real from our hidden drawers.