City Sounds

9/15/99

Listening to machines as I begin the day-

the air-conditioner, computer, the cars and trucks outside.

The garbage truck just blew by, gunning, squealing,  warning alarm, eating all the wood, metal and smelly God knows what in the dumpster.

No sounds of hoot owls or eagles or rushing streams here on 31st street.

It’s early now, but soon I’ll see the workers moving right and left on the sidewalk outside, Monetish in the early light..

Add the city smells of fresh coffee, bagels, carbon monoxide, and the mural is complete.

Today, into this rawness, I will mix in my moments and hours of effort and longing, my angst and my bliss

stirred in with all the laughter and tears,  the perfume and sweat

And God?  In the midst of all this?  In the soggy

kleenix and subway grease as much as the clouds  above floating between the buildings?.

In the street puddles and polluted East River as much as in the mountain stream?

Maybe.