It’s ‪7:00pm‬, You Feeling My NY City?


a nighttime crescendo, daily grows stronger for longer,
a major miracle for a city where blasé arrivée so fast in
a New York City Minute, uncool, you’re done, see ya,
starring in your-***-banging-solo-reality-show

but this loving polyglot *** clanging, more akin to being in...A Chorus Line?
no stopping a diurnal ritual, soon to be the longest running musical,
a clap & dance prayer ‪@ 7:00PM‬ sharp, a very civilized NY hour,
quarantine is French for sleeping-in, we vive les temps viral!

‪this evening service, no choral motet, no anthem rock,‬ nope,
just a single note, a cheer, a celebratory count, taking stock,
we noise makers beat back death once again, we’re alive,
kickin’ up heels to a dance guv-anointed as NY tough

that bell ringing noise is us saying, see here, we are all heroes,
stir crazy got nothing on us, it’s a bust, no showing rust, aging,
in a city that never sleeps, we may have changed but temporarily,
an unnatural reflective silence prevailing, still take a moment to say:

our city’s style, no way Jose, this noise is a surround sound blessing,
it’s a street sign, “stick around,” here is our home, not going down,
we are troops, seasoned by history, how to survive, sheltering live,
underneath our huge racket, we quiet whisper, raucously shout

staycationing here, my homies

May7th

5:35AM

I’ll tell you. You can hear it on the map.

At the window, on the terraces,
clapping, yelling, cheering,
jiggling piggy banks, blowing toy horns,
banging pots and pans, even ringing
some gone-very-far-astray cowbells.

in their cars, honking horns,
at the dinner table, inside,
families with little kids cheering,
while supper super cools, no matter.

It is the moment of our everyday,
when we thank those whose who
risk their lives to save, so we may survive
to live to see our children’s children thrive.

the EMT’s, doctors, nurses, firemen,
the police, even the subway & bus drivers,
who take them to their jobs, and honor with
extra banging and unsilenced tears for

those who have passed in performance,
their unseen courage is marked on our eyes,
their extraordinary service to us is a forever
medaled upon our skin, in our lungs, it is
their air we breathe, freely...
our living keepsake of their duty.

4/14/2020
7:30pm