Blanche Saffron Kabengele

Rapping Richmond Village

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development HUD built Richmond
Village in 1962 to provide subsidized and low-income housing for the West End’s
African American community.

I arouse to memory sounds of beer bottles breaking
in alleyways accepted and constant where I grew up, now a project then a
progressive plan plopped apple core center of a Queen’s West End. Namesake
Richmond Street before I-75 progressed it away. The I’ve got a secret summer
nights’ whispering wind calming available ears. Ogling too young to play standing
room only card games trumped up slammed down on unstable tables, who’s right
who’s wrong true as spring rains family fights. Park Town apartments first place
rank, Park Town Café but a jazz note away.

I rap the soul out of blues billowing Rockwell moments, this favorite aunt, grandma,
this somebody’s sweet potato pie promises. Its three-story Lego like buildings.
Near death mops hanging from the red brick second and third story breezeways.
Yellowed brick road walkways intersecting about this working-class domicile a
place where a Day Worker’s honest pay; car fare amounted to the right to live there,
where clothes lines billboard a bounty of blue-collar shirts, where splinters herald
a playground swing seat’s duty. A place where folks talked about other folks like
everywhere else.

I pump a fist thinking of Leo Cardenas ML ball player cooked ate and slept there
same as us. Lenny Mo Soul and his daily proclamations about him being happy
about him being Black about him being proud and all. And Shock and Jimmy Lee’s
more beast than beauty unforgettable facades. And Big Louie’s hamburger joint
bragging a blues fed juke box. And the Regal Theatre bopping movies and Motown
stage shows seeping free music under the door. Who’s right who’s wrong true as
spring rains family fights. And wash tub barbecue pits’ tattooing smoked rib wafers
across the sky rapping about this neighborhood’s cultural identity.

Blanche Saffron Kabengele author of Conjugal Relations of Africans and African Americans and Quiet as It’s Kept, Me Too and Other Poetic Expressions of Life holds a doctorate in Educational Studies University of Cincinnati, and has published poetry in East Fork Journal, For A Better World, and W-POESIS. Blanche and husband Peter spent three summers in the DRC Congo, travelling Europe, and experiencing the uncomplicated existence down under where kangaroos outnumber people.