#CityscapeChronicles

Inspired by [Mountain Building : by Victor Hernández Cruz ]


The cityscape: a canvas of life,
Skyscrapers reaching for the sky,
Like giant sequoias in a concrete forest.
Windows reflecting the sun's dance,
Is this cityscape a circuit board,
With pulsating energy, electric veins
Connecting heartbeats?

In the horizontal metropolis, dreams take flight,
From the windows of high-rise nests,
And though what you see are a bustling city,
Its nature's heartbeat throbs within.
It's nature taking an escalator,
Through urban canyons, leading to
Subterranean trails. They say from Brooklyn
And Manhattan,
A concrete jungle like the subway in
Constant motion.

The streets wander in your deep thoughts,
Neon lights make music in the
Heart of noise.
What are we stepping on? Asphalt fields kissed by rain,
Concrete earth, later the sands of the
Atlantic.
The sculpture of the inner city,
Down there where you thought only subways
And unnamed rats parade.

John stands on a corner,
Deciphering every face.
Feeling the pulse as he passes
Through at the bottom of the skyscraper
Where the boiler makes dreams.
The spirit emerges out of a hole
In the city that rises like a
Steel wall.

People come in making jazz sounds,
An invisible map out of the urban fabric.
Pigeons arrive in the vicinity and sing
Chorus while street artists make
Murals out of walls and place colors
On their faces.
Fountains like nature's faucets
Caress the back of Lady Liberty,
Goddess to all whose tongues have the
City's echoes.

Hallway of murals like masterpieces,
Made by artists when they had spray cans.
You see the fish with skyscrapers inside
Their eyes.
Hanging near the doorways where
Lady Luck turns the keys.

City Manhattan,
Breeze of street food made from
Hotdogs.
Slide down the stairs to your
Heart and like a mesmerized apple,
You float down the street.
And win all your hands at life.

The dreamers live on the top floor eating
Dreams and have a pigeon on the roof.
Africans import jazz from the club.
The Indians make a base of curry
On the first floor.
The building is spinning itself into
a spiral of life.
Heaven must be calling or the residents know the direction,
Because there is an upward pull.
If you rise too quickly from your seat,
You might have to comb a spirit’s hair.

They float over the rooftops,
Arrive through the smog,
Appear through the plaster of Paris.
It is the same people in the windowed skyscrapers.



© Laloselix