From the top of the stairs an opening
appears, past street lights and buildings
without windows. A rippled blanket of
dusty air turns up after trucks and buses.
Humidity attacks the skin with the local flavor
from back alleys and abandoned trash.
A screen door slaps shut. A voice rises above
the din of traffic as creatures of dusk pull at
the cords of evening’s curtains; a radio
scratches out a song like a faded tattoo.
Street corners fill with familiar faces.
Asphalt owns everything. The trees are gone.
Busy hands weave into the thread of the city.
Roger Singer 