Canary yellow taxi-cabs, wait for their fares, idling along theater row,
in rustling taffeta and black tie tux with fine Cuban blends and Arpege,
tipping with bills that smell of leather, they call every cabby “Joe”
Separated by the void of ethnicity and the driver’s wire cage.
Unmistakably Mestizo, with darting dark eyes. He is young.
At shift-end he’ll toss the keys to the next Joe at home base.
The metallic taste of their brass finds its way to his tongue,
as he nervously tweaks the facial hair, newly grown on his face.
In his broken language, he mutters “hello, where you go?”
He knows this city almost as well as the back of his father’s hand.
The sting of remembrance lingers.
His Madre weaves baskets and sculpts St. Francis’ face in bread dough.
There is magic in her fingers.
She sells them both as novelties, to tourists that visit her stand.
His Padre stays lost in a tequila haze, his pockets filled with sand.
Here, weaving through traffic all night, a young cab driver, called Joe.
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