This is the spot—the table
beside the escalator. Orange metal
railings mean nothing
to each stranger who steps aboard. She counts
the walkers—only one
so far. Stand
on the right, pass
on the left. She learned it
in the London Tube,
rediscovered it in the NYC Subway,
won’t let it go above
or below grade. It never made it
to this side of the Mississippi. Movement
along these banks depends—
on everything, even
that orange rail.
She is one
of three sisters
too. She dives
into her own
wrecks. She can’t pick
up all that slack
on the line. But
she’ll celebrate
the way those combat
boots sink.
Is the book
still king
on some other planet? Do inventions run
along parallel sun
rays? She asks
these questions without knowing
what to believe
anymore about the universe or red doors. Who
she might trust
to protect these poems
from shattering into weightless space debris
is who she might ask
to answer the rest.
To judge the games
others watch, their fictions,
what’s cold
to another person’s skin. She watches
seasons break
down, intersect, run
along parallel tracks
like subway lines
because she sometimes counts
more than four. And who’s going
to tell her to tally
the world another way?
She pitches pennies
on the floor in the back
of a New York taxi cab
with twins
she used to know. Thirty-five
years. Nap dreams mean
nothing unless she chooses
to shape them
into visions to augment
the afternoon light.
She’s not going to
google those boys—
learned her lesson.
She doesn’t want to kill
off any more of her past
sooner than it needs to expire.
She vows not
to fear the rain
that may come. Words
she may exchange
with a stranger, banker,
barista, vintage dress
shop owner. The best
road to ending
sentences. Answering
the phone. She has said
no vows
before—fears
it may be too late.
To believe a city’s breathing
can awaken prairie grass,
to know a river
did not freeze
behind her, to inspect
high clouds in search
of an old lover’s
face (any one would do)
is to be
more than a witness
to these strange days,
stranger nights.
The crumbs
she brushes off
the table will become
the place
she dreams
of reaching by train
before civil dawn. And
the rhythm
she feels
will overpower anything
any one
of us might hear.
More than the foot I broke
outside Van Cortlandt Park.
And the friends
and family and
strangers who visited
me up there. To be at the end
of the line
at night and first
on the train the next
morning, to be safely wedged
northwest, to be rich
in two hours’ worth of rhythmic
thought each day is
to be more than the sum
of 160 steps up.
Night & Day Poems of Amy Nash 