The First New York Adventure

by John Grey

We slept where we could,

even on the underground.

We woke up to diagrams of L trains

and the quickest route to the Cloisters.

You were crumpled on my shoulder.

Can a person be any more tired,

That's the beauty of travel.

If it's not the mind, it's the body asking questions.

We were in New York looking for a place

cheap enough to have us. And maybe work.

We didn't bum small change or cigarettes.

No wish to be the ones that people ran from.

Park benches were comfortable enough.

Likewise the grass beneath the trees

in Central Park, more evidence of God's benevolence

or a city planner's at any rate.

And we had our books beside.

I thumbed through my soggy Herman Hesse.

You preferred Colette's short stories.

Vignettes of the feminine soul, you called them.

And there was nothing cozier than the reading room

of the Public Library.

We each had a million books and, if needed,

a darkened corner chair where a head could nod.

When you got sick, I half-carried you to the free clinic

In the waiting room, there’d be people just like us

but older. Got into fights some. Poisoned alcohol

others. Okay, so they weren’t Hegelian philosophers.

We loved movies and sometimes sat in theaters

all day long. Once again, we'd sleep.

We woke to AI Pacino clearing out all rivals

to the Corleone family.

It grew colder of course, and days shorter.

With snow falling, wind blowing, our survival

now was down to youth and love. You wanted

home. Me too. This clearly wasn't destiny.

The intention was never to make it there,

just make it of us, some underground rumble,

bagel salt, tenement stoop, art store window,

side-walk hawker, like grit for the guts.

Back home, we were the couple who spent

four months in New York and lived to tell.

But no, we lived a little more than that,

and mostly kept our silence.