Old New York

                                      

What comfort in a photo of

The dead? You may like looking, but

They can’t look back. I click

On the Internet once more: video

Someone spliced and posted, “Old New

York.” In grainy sepia, a throng swells

Henry Street, black coats, long skirts, all

Hats and caps. Some glance up curiously

At me as they pass. Cart-horses, ponderous,

Plod by. Your ear keeps straining for

The clip-clop you can’t hear. On sidewalks

Crammed with fruit stands, crates, the crowd

Swerves, breaks to reconverge: a random

Face jerks as frames skip. An officer

In tall round helmet twirls his stick like

A cartoon. Far down the street, feet planted

Square, a boy stares straight your way at

What you cannot see: that strange contraption,

The  tripod. He tosses an apple up

And down. Cut: grand procession, sunny

Avenue. Bystanders, cheering mute, wave

Tiny frantic flags. Old film projected at new

Speeds: once-stately tread, marchers in

Some dark uniform, now rocking side

To side, near-comic doubletime.

Borne in their midst, like the Ark of

The Covenant, what they most love:

Proud water carriage. Firemen! Lost,

Blotted—massive shadow falls,

The triangular blurred Flatiron

Building. Cut: factory girls, lined up

To punch the clock, one unforgiving time

Card in each hand. Each girl, the same

Pale shirtwaist and hairstyle, wave

Piled on top—fashion?—or fear

Of shuttles, belts, and blades? Too

Young, too old, to ever hear of

Roosevelt? One girl alone wears on her

Shoulders some odd shawl—Greek?—

Hand touching her hair tumbling

And unkempt, she smiles straight

At the lens, as if she hides

A secret. Cut: bodies hurtling, flying

Through the air—the arms flung

Out, churning for ballast—flurries,

Skaters, Central Park. One boy who

Glides by wobbles, crashes, strikes

His knees, and struggling up, is

Shoved down by some faceless

Man. Cut: wide shot form

Across the water—hunkered

Like a fortress on a foggy

Shore, ancient Manhattan, camera

Panning, left to right, toward.

Frozen? Stopped. And

Now the maker—on

A whim?—superimposes

On the skyline the Twin

Towers, to show where they

Would go, would

Have gone. The apple

The boy tosses rises,

Falls, each time I

Watch. Each time,

The same tired cart-horse,

Poised in the same

Spot, hears some odd

Sound, and turns

Its head. No one,

Of course—not that

Boy, and not his dog

Sitting beside, ears

Pricked, alert—is still

Alive. Did the factory

Girl survive to have

A wedding, bear

A child? I turn it

Off. I touch my hair.

She smiles.