New York

                                                   your wind tunnel maze, your teats and teeming children,                                                    your smell of pretzels, your wheels of commotion,                                                    your angels in the wilderness, your black-hatted rabbis,                                                    your wide berths where money turns into lights,                                                     your narrow corridors of rats and knife blades,                                                    your bookstalls, your culture, your temperature shock,                                                    your leisure in the absence of lawns and landscaping,                                                    your seasons with their tokens, the world as a set,                                                    your mother-daughter shopping, your racing forms and stubble,                                                    your museums with their air of significance,                                                    your skyline vacuumed by governments, your Gargoyles                                                             waiting for the Apocalypse,                                                    which will debut here, if and when it comes.