Where are the old ladies of the old neighborhood
shoveling the snows of yesteryear off the sidewalks
and stoops—Mrs. Keenan, overweight mother of ten,
dead too soon, or Mrs. Kennedy, also overweight,
mother of cops and garbage men, and her youngest
who died at 40, or Aunt Tess, my beautiful old Aunt
Tess, whose apple pies I want always to be available
to me, as I want her wise, funny, complaining voice
right now on the other end of this phone?

Where is Mother Augustine and her 4th grade students?
There are desks for them and lessons to be mastered.
There are pretzels and cookies, ink wells, Pope pictures,
Jesus incantations, pledges of allegiance, multiplication
tables, mite boxes, catechism questions, lunchtime
in the street, with tag, and johnny on the pony,
and points, and stickball, until the bell rings
them all back inside for more.

Where are Maria, Barbara, Mary Ann, Pat, and
Bernadette? Round, ripe, smart, tough, full of nerve,
they have wandered far away, to California, New Jersey,
Connecticut, to a secret village by a river or lake
where they lie awake at night examining their consciences,
their bodies, their moonlit memories of lost nights
in the forgotten Bronx of our earliest delights.