two weeks
in and out
a perpetual
Go
Go
Go
from New York
to Maryland
(to Adelphi, to Baltimore, to Ocean City, to Frederick, to DC)
to New York
to Upstate
(to Batavia, to Byron, to Elba, to Waterport)
to New York
and now
are we still
Go…Go…?
from Brooklyn
to the Bronx
to Manhattan
and back
and back
and back?
or is there a moment
of rest
to recover
(or is the rest
also going to be
from bedroom
to Zoom
to Zoom
to Zoom
continually
ad infinitum
and on and on and on?)
did some things
yesterday
this morning
just now
will continue to do things
as the day goes by
(a nice thing about holidays
when you’re still placing caution
from The Virus™
before familial or friendship
hangouts)
and the accomplishments
of cleaning
and organizing
can breathe new life
into this small box
and make it
more like
home.
running out to the sidewalk
big chunks of snow falling
pockmarking the small white hills,
the yellow of a taxi cab
shining
in the not-quite-twilight of
5:45 pm
on a february friday,
the haze of pink-ish-purple
lighting the sky
in that way that
only an NYC dusk truly can,
my eyes adjusting to clearer vision,
happy
(for once)
to exist.
the moment passed
without much fanfare
of how long we’ve been living in NYC with
[rather than without]
a pandemic at our heels.
i thought it would feel different
but time hasn’t felt ‘natural’
since March.
the days pass in decades
and months are gone by the time you
open your eyes from a
blink.
it would have been
somewhere
around late July
and we’ve known more New York
within COVID
than out
and even if we track
for those weeks we stayed
preparing for the eventual move
and even if we track
for those weeks i visited
before knowing i’d ever
live here
let’s get all those weeks
out of the way
and add a buffer
and still
late September
and i’ve known more about COVID New York
Pandemic New York
Quarantine New York
than pre-any-of-this.
and yet
the whole effect of living in a place
in a quarantine
is that you don’t see the city
so maybe take out the days we were stuck inside?
but that’s more math than i’m willing to do right now
instead i’ll ask
has there really ever been a ‘real’ way
to live in
New York City?
there is a silence
in the country
in the backwoods
that unnerves me
any creak of the house
or wind in the trees
sends my anxiety rising to levels
far above those rustling leaves
simply because it is outside the norm
in the city, there is a collage of noises every night
and you never know where anything is coming from
and you just learn that it is part of the auditory landscape
and it lulls you to sleep, like a very unique kind of white noise machine
the lullaby of the city
of sirens
harmonizing with three different genres of music
blasting out of un-mufflered cars
and the steady hum of the downstairs bathroom fan
somehow melding into the far away helicopter
distorted by distance
and they all cacophonize
into one quiet whisper
of ‘you’re safe
you’re safe
you’re safe
now go to sleep’
and you sleep better than
you have in weeks
(it feels so good to be home)
On my rooftop I see:
1. a green tree across the street
2. a match to the folding chair under me
3. a pigeon, hopping on the next roof, its eyes as red as the
4. red brick apartment across the road
5. a treeline, it might be the park?
6. a metal fence, so I don’t fall off
7. this private rooftop terrace, that my privilege helped get me
8. satellite dishes from DirectTV
9. a/c units sticking out of 6th floor windows
10. clouds and a flash of what may be a rainbow
11. my rainbow hair blowing in the polluted wind
12. no sign nor sight of a way to make this poem end
13. sounds of busses, bodega music, wings flapping, construction; scents of the laundromat around the corner,
and wind, so much wind, against my face, feeling a chill on this hot New York afternoon, perhaps//
a loud boom, a bang, was it from the west or the east?
i strain my neck over the gate, and the only answer i see
is the smell of the garbage truck, stopped on my street.
i have so many unfinished poems written
but not the stomach to stomach the rereading.
last night there was a cockroach
poking its feelers out from it’s rooftop hideaway
and at night it caught me by the creeps
but today in the
afternoon brightness
complete with my coffee and sun hat
i’m not quite as creeped
and maybe that’s the lesson for today:
the despair from yesterday
can turn to creativity today
which maybe someday could develop into
flow[tomorrow]
no wonder poets wonder about new york city
this place is confusing
and disgusting
and beauty
a line of SUV’s
all dark blue or black
parked on the left side of the street
one a few feet in front of the others
hazards on
trunk open
an Orthodox Jew
unloading large speakers
one by one
onto the hot pavement
a Brooklyn scene
in the morning
a downpour
hair soaked
from under a hood
in seconds as we
rush across the same street twice
trying to predict our Lyft driver’s
street familiarity
in the afternoon
too hot
for anyone’s comfort
(and we thought the rain would cool the city off)
in the evening
a hella-queer rooftop concert
as the sun sets
lavender
and
baby blue
over the NYC skyline
kipventures 