This city
nails its eyelids shut.

This city strings out
on wires, nerves
between buildings,
bannered with gray laundry.

This city is sidewalk chalk,
mapping someone’s last dance
before washing away with the grime
in a hot rain.

This city is you.
This city sops you up
like stale bread in gravy
then squeezes you out
oil smeared on pavement,
reflecting neon at night.

This city powders your bones
and sucks you up again
into nostril-like alleys.

This city of plywood eyes
never sees you crumble
never hears you moan.

To this city, you are
just another scribble of graffiti,
just another night siren
wafting on the wind
through broken windows.

10/08/2002

Author's Note: [First published in James Byrne's The Wolf, , Winter 2003.]

Posted on 10/08/2002
Copyright © 2025 Bruce W Niedt