a cup of coffee with Johnny

Somewhere there's a prairie
full of wheat and wind

and some guy named Johnny is looking
out over the crop
where the sunlight reflects gold
below
and the grace of God
above.

I'm in the city though,
here God
is in the gray skies,
the potholes, the gangsters with guns,
the lowcut blouses of whore-office-managers,
the middle eastern cab drivers,
the broken window on the 50th floor
of the brown building on State Street,
the corpse of the junkie on the Common,
and
the prayers drown out sirens
and hookers screaming
at their pimps.