"Civilized" Music

Eclectic in my musical taste but unwavering on love, on
a warm summer evening in Pittsburgh, my guard down to hatred,
I am alone but purchase tickets to chamber music…
“Music of the Great Minds.”
The gentleman selling tickets from the tiny table
in the hall, gives me an orchestra pit seat, first
row, center.
The ticket price is negligible, as many things racism deems important are.
A White man I have known for decades all but ignores
me when we cross paths, fair weather liberal, his fake
rhetoric revealed.
I am ushered to my seat and sit.
Immediately the White woman next to me is shocked.
The large White man two seats away is red faced and lynching furious and threatens to cancel his season subscription if I am allowed to stay, standing up and getting louder and louder, flailing his fists about.
Knowing race hatred to turn physically violent easily,
I leave before one note is played.
The air outside freeing, calming, of God.
Still, the Chamber music group mails me flyers to its next
"civilized" refined music concert but a red neck red face looms in my mind as the truth about race, America…hatred.
I place the flyers in the trash as punishment for the ugly lies they tell.
The broken societal bow, they hide.
Even the heart grows wiser when broken with practiced acumen, just so.