Heather Ann Schmidt

A Light on 7 Mile
For James Meetze
                                                                                                  
My stepfather told us stories
about his wedding in 1967
when he lived at the edge of Detroit
and as curfews hit
one could see flashes of light
on the horizon
from building fires, rioting.

I still see the burn marks on 
abandoned stores in Highland Park
and remember Hudson's Christmas window displays
before the rubble...
the moving figures, strings of lights
in red, green, gold.

That foggy Fourth of July in 1977
on the top of the Penobscot Building,
my Dad lifting me on his shoulders
to see
the fireworks on Windsor's side--

and now city schools are fire bombed,
wastelands of books
and term papers blown by wind,
stuck
to rusty chain linked fences.

A voice for justice crying
for equality snuffed out,
forgotten
wandering
7 Mile and Woodward

But on November 5, 2008
the words of Martin Luther King
rose their light over 7 Mile,
a circle moving outward:

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up...

Now is the time...
Now is the time...



Also from Heather Ann Schmidt:
Cranbrook
Upon Observing Virgin and Child on the Crescent Moon (c.1480) at the DIA

Contributor Bio

Heather Ann Schmidt is an adjunct professor at Oakland Community College. She edits tinfoildresses poetry journal and Quiddities Journal. Her poems can be found in various online and print journals. Her chapbook, Channeling Isadora Duncan, was recently released from Gold Wake Press and her first full collection of poems, Chasing Lou Hoover, is forthcoming from Village Green Press. She received her MFA from National University and hopes to begin pursuing her PhD at Union Institute in 2010. Visit her website at http://www.heatherannschmidt.synthasite.com.