from my window on the
39th floor, I see everything:

overcrowded bars, couples
with love and the promise of a future
swirling in their eyes.

apartment rooms, each lit,
each its own world, a universe
with messy orbits and stars
bookshelves and settees
enough gravitational pull to draw you in
towards a welcome that will never come—
oh, the longing,
it’s the lifeblood
squirming in the pit of my stomach,
reaching out through the skin
with a taut hand.

drivers ripping through the bisque-like night,
racing towards the ineffable


elsewhere.
they motion to be joined, but
speed so fast irises have a difficult time
keeping track all at once.

sometimes there will be someone
waving towards a friend in the people-filled distance.
they will join, hand-in-hand,
walk off to a café table—
I can almost feel the ripening warmth
of someone’s hand in mine
hear the conversations below
if I wasn’t so far up.