Gabriel Hart

WHEN I MET HER IN THE STREET

When I met her in the street
It was horizontally
I swear I saw her spirit escaping her body
"No, get away," she said.
"Just let me sleep."
"Let's get you up,” I pled.
"Don't fall asleep,
Stay with me."

Her eyes floated up into her head like two balloons
I shook her
Stuttering
That she would feel better soon
But then she spilled her guts
She showed me all her cuts
Like ripping out a tooth
To find the truth

An ambulance
Was out of the question
The way her eyebrows raised
When I offered to call her parents
'Cause though she was a victim
They would say she had sinned
'Cause when you cross The Cross
You have crossed your kin

She finally told me her whole name
But she looked at me like it was a mistake
She couldn't recall their names
Just a white van
No windows
Unmarked plates

I carried her into our home
Keeping vigil
With a vigilante tone
Peering through blinds
For a sign
That justice might prevail

Four nameless medium-build males
God Almighty, you've failed


Gabriel reads "When I Met Her in the Street":



Subscribe to Channel 52 for first view of new videos.


Gabriel confesses: "The poem was inspired by a real encounter and attempt to help a wounded teenage girl. On top of the terror of what she endured, there was the unforeseen stalemate of us urging police involvement versus the consequences of her religious family finding out what happened."

Author-poet GABRIEL HART lives in Morongo Valley in California's High Desert. His debut twin novel Virgins In Reverse / The Intrusion (Traveling Shoes Press) was released January 2019, with a foreword by Avant-rockabilly provocateur Tav Falco. His chapbook Cinema of Life (2016) and novelette Nothing To See Here (2017) will be incorporated into his upcoming desert speculative fiction novel Lies of Heaven, to be released unabridged by Space Cowboy in 2020. His short-fiction and poetry has recently been published by Cholla Needles, Luna Arcana, Black Hare Press (Australia) and will be the noir-flash of the week in Shotgun Honey this coming June 2020. He is a regular contributor to Space Cowboy’s Simultaneous Times podcast, as well as L.A. Record, a Los Angeles underground music publication. Hart also taught the writing workshop for Mil-Tree, a non-profit reach out program for Vets and Active Duty Military to heal the wounds of war.