by Chris Dollard

So a balloon is twisting up
in the power lines while I’m walking
along a street in Queens,
gazing up, thinking
it might pop before I drop
below the sidewalk,
down the stairs and spin
through the turnstile to the platform

where I stand behind the yellow line,
looking down underground,
tarnished rails and workers on the tracks
with brooms and bags, picking up
the rush hour debris, abandoned
soda bottles, clear and green and crushed
with tattered labels, floating
in the rainbow sludge between the ties,
mingling with cigarette butts and broken glass
crunching under boots.

a whistle blows and they take refuge
on the other side of the track
in rows of cubbyholes,
vanishing behind the approaching train
as brakes scream metallic
murder, silver doors jerk open
and we strangers board,

take our places, elders sitting
while kids lean and dangle
from the poles, mixing smells
of grinding metal and sundry people
as nobody breathes too deep,
daydream gazing
at all the bright advertisements,
headphones and sunglasses
donned to override the overload,
looking out plastic windows
at strangers looking back,
when we start forward
and they start backward
I reach out to grab the metal
and the lights flicker, riding into
the blinding assault of Times Square.

CHRIS DOLLARD was born in Montville, CT, and raised in South Kingstown, RI. His work has appeared in The New Verse News and The North Central Review. He is also the poetry editor for Shoreline, the Rhode Island College literary magazine, and lives in Providence.