Ode to New York
I miss New York like a lover
Sitting inside, watching the window
Holding a coffee, waiting for rain to come.
It’s icy cold today
Possibly Himalayan. Must be snowing in Srinagar
And Shimla. White drops of light pouring.
The rains must have left
For the Andamans, for the Bay of Bengal.
The sun is out. It is calm
As my mind. New York.
I miss walking into New York rain, early hours
Rain mottling, a tear or two
Misting the rear view.
I miss it like sugar, a burger, my head’s bustle.
I like it where it is, this cold
Birds twittering. The slow swish swash of the wiper
The cabbie calling out: Where to?
And me walking on, with a smile: Nowhere.
Good luck brother. I am sure you will find it.
They find everything in New York.
On Wall Street the hustle begins anew:
Since your money is also mine
Why don’t you loan it to me
And I will lend it back?
And on Chelsea, someone asks
For directions to the nearest concert
In Bowery, where doors are open all night.
The pizza joint has no missing pieces
A puzzle long solved. Yet lines linger
Long as the street, wait patient as an immigrant.
Raindrops patter, thick, we are now well clad.
Not homeless but sheltered – inside our cold dreams.
Nothing seems beyond us.
We are not beyond anything – what we once asked. What we got.
In New York, they seethe rage into a smoothie.
Here, drink it. Good for your salad soul.
But it’s the raindrops on the pane that bother me.
Each one settles into a kind of reckoning.
Each, a lost soul, someone still seeking
That perfect bottle of sunset
And finding something else.
Maybe, a new recipe.
Tonight, there’s poetry on Bowery. Jazz in Fat Cat.
Someone’s reading the history of tomorrow
At the East St bookshop in the Village.
Patti Smith just passed by. We stop at the Japanese bar.
Order rice with chicken toppings. Sushi. Breathe in the clean
Whiskey air, ask for downtime. Think it’s Tokyo not New York.
They let us stay there, forever.
After the shops close, there’s still the last bar open
The guy who plays Curtis Mayfield all night.
Where we once painted the blank walls.
The art school is closed. The artists are singing
Lovelorn songs, full of tobacco and moonstone.
I grab a breakfast bagel, cinnamon and cream.
A dark, black coffee. Feel the breeze. Imagine I am
Still in Delhi. Where chicken roasts in the oven
And Salvador Dali has just melted the grandfather clock
Next to the dining table. The one that still chimes
The history of our love, in forty-five seconds.
