Dark, quiet. I’m always amazed there are
parts of the city not jammed with people and cars.
I’m anxious to get home. Don’t like traveling
late alone. There have been incidents,
even rescues by police.
Ten thirty, Saturday evening.
I’ve just attended a poetry reading.
There is food and drink, music and dancing.
The hosts said, stay until morning.
I walk and walk, but don’t see the block-long steel wall
I made a note of emerging out of the subway station.
In the dark everything seems different.
I am the only one in the street.
“Take a cab, treat yourself on the way back,”
my husband said. “You think there will be cabs
cruising near the defunct Navy Yard?” I retorted
and once more asked him to come along.
Finally some life. Across the street a noisy bar.
Outside three couples embracing, kissing.
Reluctant to disturb them, I walk on.
Three teenage boys on skateboards jumping off
a wooden platform on a hill of earth
into traffic coming off the bridge.
Luckily there are hardly any cars.
I call out to a boy getting ready to fly off:
“Where is the subway station?”
“The other way,” he answers, feet in the air.
In my rush I had not even looked up
at the bridge. Earlier on the way to the reading,
when still light, it seemed intrusive, overwhelming,
In the dark, lit up and a young bright moon over it,
I am charmed by the sight. Before turning back,
I stand awhile looking at the bridge, watching the boys,
admiring, scared for them, hoping their luck lasts.
