They called his name Luke. When they heard the name Luke, everybody on the street knew that he was back. He said he was coming back. On the street corner, the word echoed when he got off the bus. You see Luke had caused such a hemorrhage, a real, some thought, tragedy to express the pain that he understood but he said inside and he ever did hide that he probably would always be misunderstood. The rain poured down and Houston didn’t look the same, but the flooding was about to start you see. Everyone on the block had heard that and they didn’t want it to be true that Luke Green was out of prison and he hadn’t served life you see. Through DNA, he had been released. The community began to feel the tragedy. Ms. Dixon on the corner who sat on the porch just off the third ward you see. She talked out loud and she said things like “I told you that Luke was coming back to me.” Who would know that a drug dealer like Luke would know anything about Ms. Dixon today? But it was Luke who wasn’t a drug dealer and he had a lot to say. She said, “I told you he’d be back and he told you to ‘beware’ for those of you who did him wrong. I’ll play that cut about ‘Goin’ up Yonder,’ y’all can call that your new theme song.” Everyone thought that she was crazy talking about a man named Luke, they didn’t understand her relationship to him you see. She thought he was her lover. She called him her man to be. She laughed inside because they didn’t understand what she was trying to hide in codes as she did play that way. For up on the satellites and then if you did turn right, the black vans and wagons were recording as Luke was coming back to stay. Poised to know and poised to show that he would be on the block soon you see. Everyone knew that there was a tragedy waiting for Luke was coming back for you or me.
Luke walked and waved as though he was in a parade as he came back to the block that day. It was not bright. It was barely light. It was a low lit day. He crept on the street as he was about to repeat his transgressions of the past you see. But not for Luke, this wouldn’t be a fluke but there was a payment to be made and to create a tragedy.
