On Craig and Fifth: a tribute

Roses, chrysanthemums, daisies carnations and baby’s breath presided over by you, Miss So-What who sits on cans and newspapers and whose name I finally learn when I, the nameless stranger stand guard one day after you holler in the bitter December — Hey get over here lady. I have to pee I could pretend this corner of Fifth is a vestige of a foodless market in Amsterdam, Bruges or Montignac when I come to Pittsburgh on weekends and watch you sell day after day irises that look like they have toes and some long-stemmed orange gladioli even on Sunday. But I am sure you do not care about the sadness of flowers your eyes instead on walkers and bikers and the panhandlers of Craig Street, your fingerless gloves sometimes holding a wet cigarette or a lot of change I had a friend who told a story of a man who walked up to her and kissed her here then bolted down a street. All she could do was register surprise. I remember this when I think it must not, can not be a mistake — my fall in front of you, me damaging a bridge, the bridge of my nose, a pure raw meat display, and you shooing the onlookers, you, dipping into melting ice meant to keep away flower-wilt, you, cutting an apron to make a pack for my face I waited for the polite boys in the bank knock-offs of my son, to find a first-aid kit but they would not look at anyone yelling “ice, ice,” all around us they buzzed on about risk management and options. I could have been their mother falling. I have known these boys, beautiful as stallions but that corner was yours and there you were, rags in your bucket, for the grabbing and my hurt.

Rosaly DeMaios Roffman is the founder of the Center for the Study of Myth and Folklore at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. She edited the journal of myth “Aristeia” and has collaborated on 23 works with composers, dance companies and other artists. She is the author of four books, including “Going to Bed Whole” and “I Want to Thank My Eyes.” Ms. Roffman also facilitates the Squirrel Hill Poetry Workshop.