Thursday Commute

It’s an old style train with bench seating. Hip Hop Girl, in matching leathers—hat, boots, jacket, gloves—gets the empty slot. There is a sliver left over and Little Miss Entitled in kitten heels and chic bag wedges a portion of her sizable ass into it. Little Miss knows her claim on this valuable real estate is rude and audacious, so she angles her body away from Hip Hop, and feigns oblivion by using her parsimonious little lips to sip from her designer go-mug.

I prepare myself for a Brooklyn style throw down, jangling nerves vs. irritated sensibilities, long-time hard core vs. fluffy clueless gentry. But Hip Hop’s mouth turns up just a little in private amusement and she fiddles with her pink iPod. When she looks up, our eyes meet and we grin at each other, our smiles a silent word balloon.



Some kind of Manhattan Stonehenge: the alignment of the earth; today’s sunrise; the placement of buildings; the movement of truck traffic, have all conspired to throw a column of pure daylight down the subway stairs.

As she descends, the updraft from an approaching train lifts her hair, the light catches it, and she is haloed, a brilliant star falling into the underground.

(fekkin cell-phone camera not working or this would not be a narrative. monkey poop.)