For Moa

How many years have passed since that bright spring morning at the end of March, at the end of innocence. When eggs fell from the sky and your laugh would echo in the corridor. I always thought I would never forget your laugh. I try now, but I cannot hear it. But I remember your turqoise sweater and your post-Asia tan. I remember seeing in you the future upon which I was to embark. I saw in you the hope I had not dared wish for myself.

I rode the tram past your house the day you died. I looked out at your neighborhood and thought I should text you to see how you were. I got busy anticipating my arrival and never sent it, but you wouldn't have seen it anyway. I still have your number in my phone, but I try to skip it quickly when I pass through the Ms.

On our way to the funeral, we were laughing and joking and everything was unreal. We stopped at a gas station to change into formal attire; it was a long drive. I don't remember anyone saying anything on the way home. I cried for you the entire time; I cried until there was nothing left, and I could barely stand. I saw your parents and thought, they will always have lost you. I suspect I cried more for myself than anything else. Such is Life, when you are forced to consider it.

We would still talk about you from time to time. And I think we got closer because of it; we looked out for each other like we were all frail baby chicks. But everyone grieves differently, and Time does what it will with our wounds.

It was an awfully high building. I am afraid of heights. You jumped, you soared, I suppose you hoped for weightlessness and freedom. You taught me that I already had that right here.

That summer, a dear friend said Something is different. You look happy. I thought of you then, and I thanked you.

Coming True

Here it is, right here on the left, the red house. Having navigated the Greenwich Village streets, the cab stopped. Upended the heavy suitcases, the sprouts of a whole new life, on the sidewalk. We dragged the bags upstairs, fiddled with unknown locks, and went inside. Welcome home, I said, and we giggled like school girls.

A short inspection round later, we sat on the fire escape drinking rosé bubbly from large margarita glasses, toasting to all sorts of things. Charles street looked like a movie set, the sky so surreal, the rain, the street light, the silence. But then, the whole thing was surreal. Here she was, with her dream job, in her dream home, living this unreachable life because she'd reached it. I say it takes perseverance. She says it's important not to forget that it is possible.

She is right of course. Too easily, we forget that our dreams are, in fact, within our reach. That they are not impossible visions in the distance, but possible futures, should we fight for them. I was immensely proud of her then. I walked home in the drizzle, Morton street mere minutes away. We did good, I think.

In the Quietest Waters

Another Monday with New York State flood warnings. We have fallen into routine, apparently. I eat left over Sunday dinner and write lists, to evoke some semblance of productivity. Still, a Cuban cafe con leche lingers in my blood stream, a speakeasy IPA, and I am content, taping packages, checking bank statements, scouring airline websites. Ignoring FAQs about pneumonia, I swallow ephedrine cold pills to dampen the symptoms, but all that happens is that adrenaline rushes through my systems, making my eyes perk up. Who needs antidepressants.

Maybe it's just spring. Maybe it's just my hibernated self bubbling back into the nerves. Why would I fight that?

Last night, at my stop on the one, two young men got stabbed to death in a subway car. After all my orating about the safeties of the village, about never feeling scared, a Saturday night out got a gruesome ending right here, right underneath my feet. Suddenly, my comforting womb of underground tunnels appears a death trap out of which there is no escape, no apology, until the next stop is called and the doors can open to let you out.

Life is treacherous. Navigate best you can, lock your doors. Just don't forget to dance, too.

Slam Baby. Stay Mad.

Wind so cold but we turned a corner to jump and scream and dance, our minds already racing with decorations and potted plants and warm spring days spent in that courtyard, while the official stance was that nothing is set until you hold those keys in your hand. The lunch consisted mostly of bubbly flutes and It really is the best neighborhood, after all. The waiters thought their place was too nice for just anybody and were very pleased when the Big Name chose them for his sandwich needs.

A long way east and it's poetry slam night on the Alphabet Avenues. We sit at the bar; I stare intently at the worn wood to see the poets' words dance along it. Some parts are shiny, some parts are dull. Tips amass along it; the bartender stacks it, or not, according to some system no one understands, perhaps not even himself. The words echo through the high ceilings, forever repeated in the brick wall, sometimes forgotten, and I hope you brought your mojo tonight. Bobbing to the beat.

We have different ways of getting where we're going. The important thing is to get on your feet. The zippers on my shoes clink clink all the way down Morton. My fiery lungs and I go to sleep, but only on paper.

Feel Brand New

Frenetically talking up lost time at 60 miles an hour, as though no time had passed, or no geography, and as though spending time together in a yellow cab were commonplace. But then there it was, around the bend, the Manhattan skyline towering in the windshield and presenting itself as if for the first time. She paused, she stared, and I laughed at the glitter in her eyes.

By the time we emerged from the Midtown tunnel, my eyes saw the City as brand new, too. Boring, boorish 34th street suddenly a giggle, rainy Chelsea gleaming in the late night lights. I stared out the window as our conversation began to drift. There was too much to say anyways. What would become of this mad adventure, and I can't believe I am really here now.

But once I had dropped her off at the landmark hotel and began trudging the drizzly streets home, my City returned to me. This place that is not new. This place that is not unknown.

This place that is home.

Why do we still live in this repulsive town
all our friends are in New York.

Sprung

Warm musty New York spring evening and suddenly we are all alive and maybe even well. The smells of the street are back, concrete, garbage, perfumes drift by as I navigate narrow, crooked West Village sidewalk mazes. Croci grow around barren, waking trees, and from the west, a late sunset trickles through the streets. My steps are quick, long, straight, bouncing, and when I look people in the eye, I remember what it is to be alive. Hibernation sneaks up on me like a dark silent storm each year, but spring springs with song and dance and colored confetti, dependably.

I return to Morton after viewing an apartment on Charles Street, beautiful, dreamy, tree-lined Charles Street with its magnolia courtyards and date-night-kissed stoops. It wasn't even for me but for my dear friend arriving with the late flight from Paris; no matter, the feeling is the same. The potential. Walking this street I have stepped on so many times before, this time doing so in a new light, like Could I live here, and what would that feel like? I was completely satisfied with the answer.

The truth is, tonight there is nowhere I would rather live. This beautiful city of water towers and taxicabs, of hopes and sweat and tears, my New York. April approaches, life approaches, and unending potential lies in the margins. I take my notebook and I get on the A train. At JFK waits a newbie, and, like a junkie, I long to see the city through her eyes; a dream come true, a life in the making, bright, shiny, and unexplored. How could it not blow us all away?

Equinox

The night holds no power over the day now. There is more light than there is dark. If only the same were true for the corners of the soul.

Still, every day I look out my window, and the magnolia tree in the courtyard is a little more alive. The buds grow, expand, burst into pink jewels on the barren tree.

It's a tricky balancing act, this.