That week we thought we’d stay in California.
The boxes in our room were just a place
for our host’s cat to pounce on, a place
for us to imagine our next move.
Without kids or cats to slow us down,
we could stay here.  Or move on.

That afternoon we walked out to the Mission,
found the place that could have been
our theater, no matter where we lived:
Oakland or San Francisco.  We were returning
to the world of architecture and old movies,
all we had left behind two years ago.

That evening we watched The Great Dictator,
forgetting the scratchy seats and chipped ceiling,
the smell of popcorn, food we couldn’t afford to eat.
We laughed at Hinkel’s dance, were moved
by the Barber's speech.  Others around us 

were pretending they’d live, be well
while we pretended we could stay in this city.
                        

I remember the subway, LA’s Blue Line.
Except for the palm trees, skaters, Slurpee-colored
surf, this could be our city—with motels not
row houses, with gleaming old cars not buses.

That cold night we ate ice cream in the lobby:
mint chip and Death by Chocolate.  We wore
our new coats and joked we could visit LA,
even live there with that subway.  

You said you’d had enough of the tiny sun
that had barely melted last week’s ice and snow.
The moon and stars glinted; the sky was black ice.
You said you’d like to step outside

without your new coat, without fear of the wind,
even though we’d just come back from out west and
we were happy with our new TV and all
the old movies and Celtics games we could watch.

I don’t know if you ever made it out to
LA, rode the Blue Line, or watched men play at
the Venice courts.  I know the Capitol is
still open, serving this year’s flavors: Red Bull

and Oreo Stout.  I don’t know if you still
want to leave this city.  I know you have not.
                        

Tiny houses gather on the site
of what used to be
a strip mall.  Past nine o’clock,

the sun sets over the mountains.
Residents of the village, 
formerly unhoused,

are washing dishes in the cup-sized sinks,
or sitting out on the stoops,
waiting for their friends to come home  

from work.  Their voices lower;
they no longer have to compete
with the frat boys’ bars on 13th 

or with Franklin Boulevard, an eight-lane 
river clogged with buses, cars, and trucks
and the music bursting from each.

In the new village,
the residents have no curfew.

Thirty years ago, when I lived near here,
stringy-haired men and women
huddled in bus stops,

as if waiting for a ride
that would not come until morning.
Others were wedged beneath the overpass

or sprawled on downtown sidewalks,
finding sleep in the early evening
despite raised voices from passers-by. 

These days the unhoused have jobs,
working at Wal-Mart or the university.
They even have cars.

At the new village, no longer unhoused,
they are safe.