Dawn once more,
burnishing old brick,
piercing shut windows.

The sun comes back again,
but without the hubbub, the overpowering din.

So quiet out, so still,
it’s my reward for a succession of days
too much alike.

If there’s to be a sound,
I will have to make it.
If anything’s to move,
I’ll need to slip on my shoes,
step out.
I do just that.

At the top of the stoop,
even when doing nothing,
I’m livelier than the rest of the street.

Before me is a neighborhood 
of virgin concrete, flocculent sky.

And, unlike at night,
it’s the houses, the stores, the park,
that are much in evidence,
and the light that’s invisible.

World-to-myself euphoric, 
I stroll two blocks,
get coffee and newspaper
at the one place open.

On an outdoor table,
other places unfold,
but none are as kind 
to people as this.

A sparrow sings
from high in a nearby branch.
That’s the only other life
I’d consider worth my living.
                        

The flight attendants are strapped in.
They are no longer rushing 
up and down the aisles,  
attending to every need of first class,
slamming overhead bins,
calming two crying children,
in economy.
For now, they are all one of us,
cuffed by seatbelt,
very much alone. 
 
The airplane is in a line
at the top of the runway.
Three jets are in front of us.
We slowly roll forward.
Stop again.
Roll forward.
Stop again.

But the plane has had enough of waiting.
No more rolling.
It’s time for a full-on charge.
Engines set free,
we zoom down that tarmac 
like a dragster,
the scraps of scenery flung backward,
as my hands grip the armrests,
so I don’t join them.

Will this jet take off?
Will we crash into the nearby houses?
And, if we do get off the ground,
will winds shake us 
like loan sharks after their dough?

We all have our own fears
and there’s no way to share them.
We’re like peas in a pod.
But with no two touching.
                        

Mark me absent from the family dinner,
that ritual of overcooked food, 
stale jokes and tidbits gleaned from talk radio,
punctuated with boorish laughter,
coughing fits and loud belching.

I won’t be around
for that trial before self-appointed judges
to defend where I live, what I earn,
the company I keep.

I’ve had enough 
of bowing down to aunts and uncles,
sipping cheap wine, breaking bread,
in a kind of unholy communion.

And my unmarried trio of second cousins
can try their cackling 
“hubble, bubble, toil and trouble routine”
on some other poor fool.

So make that one less 
heirloom china plate
on the blue cerulean table cloth.
One less setting of dainty silverware.
Allow me to be cynical, jaundiced,
along with impolite and ungrateful.

I get it. We’re family.
We share the same blood.
But then so do the pigs
and the butchers
in a slaughterhouse.