All Along the Billyburg Bridge

I slalom shalom and salaam
inhale the aerosol vapors evaporating
from the infamous anonymous like, “Spaceinvader”
I scan the dried up ostensible words misspelled.

“Save Domino” is code for “Welcome home, Sugar.”
The repeated stencil that reads, “you wish you knew,”
becomes a refrain to the path on the way.
Throughout the day you wish you knew who wrote that
and what they meant. You wish you knew
becomes an unabating audible taunt and I wish I knew
where I heard it first.

We skim the constructions to measure the progression of time.
Steel red bars run parallel perpendicular acute and obtuse above us—
a tricky sundial to reminds us that we’re all asymmetrical shadows.
Plastic steel and wheel have stopped beneath us
as we barely steal a glance at each other
a smile perhaps a nod perhaps in camaraderie.

Where are you going and where have you been
“I wish I knew”—cries the collective reverie
Gotta go Gotta leave Gotta run Gotta arrive Gotta be there
not here now the painted arrows agree
and disagree when the towers are barely lit and barely
extinguished. Somewhere someone can see the skyline
a cutout of skyscrapers adjacent to the headstones.

Everything asks for an engraving beyond the graveyard.
Like the sleeves of the riders rapidly representing a rainbow
Charged and Ephemeral passing swift in Deep V rims of wheels
all colored hoops and drop bars and flat bars and riser bars
and all manner of hats and caps and bells and hoop earrings and dangling things
off the bodies we will never know as we dance past Sad Gleeful. We ride on saddles giddy together as we cut each other off Unspoken
etiquette constantly a broken etiquette. We choke together
over gridlock over carbon and the east river running

I wish I knew you in 1903, but here’s the Queensboro majestically
manifesting terrestrial rays from the morning sun and the Manhattan
and the Brooklyn and the armpits that unite them. Signals change
and seagulls always stay the same. There will be messengers below
guarding the passage to no end suspended
no beginning cantilevered.