All my
memories of New York
are like one night stands,
hazy flashes revolving
around
unremarkable hotel rooms.
I can no longer tell what I did
and what I saw on Seinfeld.
The episodes blur together,
fuse together,
without pattern or texture.
I wonder how
long it will take
this weekend to dissolve
into vague Gotham colours
and smells.
How long before my mind
masks the faces of musicians
rushing along restaurant row--
from dinner jazz to Broadway shows,
quiets the voices of village poets
staged witty and woeful,
stems the
flow of urban nasal drip
onto awnings and pedestrians,
erases the
tattered image of the
red umbrella discarded on West 57th
inches from
an empty trash can.
But it really
doesn't matter.
As I sit here in LaGuardia,
waiting to leave New York,
I know I'll be back.
