From the Bronx

I write away to get
from the bowels
of a building in a city I left behind,
a certificate to prove I was born

in an alien time
when little boys wore
lace and short pants.

Now I wait for the mail,
each day in the fright
of someone drifting.

Suppose, I obsess,
they don't find me
among the millions
who cover my trace.

How will I go home?
Well if I waste
my remaining years

hiding in the basement
among the spiders
the official people
can't expel me.