Wanted In Thirty-eight States

Coming back from midtown Subway Sunday slow
A Train to Brooklyn
A younger older man
He asks,
"Are you famous?"
Like Ulysees to the cyclops I say,
"I am no one."
He begs to differ.
"You are someone.
My name is Prince.
From East New York.
I done twenty-five.
For five murders.
The po-lice shot me in the head.
My wife pulled out the bullet.
No hospital."
"When?"
"1986."
The crack years.
Young boys in wheelchairs,
The Rock on East 11th Street,
Gunshots in the night.
Day too.
He had a story.
Many.
"I been out fourteen years.
Never going back.
My wife ran the money.
I was a boss.
I was wanted in 38 states.
My name Prince."
We shook hands
His hand was rough.
I ran the numbers.
He had to be 60.
Almost half his life
Behind walls
Still smiling
Thinking I was famous
I decided to be honest.
"I'm not anyone but I'm not nobody too. Do you want to be not nobodies too "
I love Emily Dickinson.
So did Prince,

"Then we can be not nobodies together."

We didn't know each other
But we knew our Emily Dickinson
And me my Rilke.
Poetry time another time.

"387 Myrtle."

Him

"2078 Pitcairn."

We punched knuckles.
At Fulton Street.
Another time
Another smile
We both alive.
And free.
Free as a smile can make us.

His name is Prince. Mine.
Mine is no one.

New York Desolation - Poem November 30 1976

A last kiss through cold steel bars
Accompany your parting glance
Our worlds, met and joined
Drift away in this final act
Your steps echo off tunnel walls
Becoming your last trace
And they too vanish under the roar
Of the subway that gives you escape
In that moment I call out desperate
) You don't turn around and I leave the station
On Lexington Avenue the pre-dawn light takes your place
You go to your empty bed and sleep
Pretty boys on 53rd and 3rd greet me
Yawns say hello too
I ignore both
Dwelling in the past
Remembering long-lost seconds we shared at dawn
Once this pain would have crippled me
Today the agony makes my soul steel
I suppose if I wasn't so tired
I might even have cried
Only my soul has long been bankrupt
And the morning haze blocks out the sun
That cursed sun
It's no friend of mine
Nothing is now
Nothing but pain

Broadway Junction - Crossroads

Broadway Junction has been Brooklyn's busiest subway station for over a hundred years. Six lines converge in East New York to service the outer-lying neighborhoods of New York's largest and most populous borough; the A, C, J, L, and Z. Most of the station rises above the streets on steel girders.

To the north the Jackie Robinson Parkway runs through miles of cemeteries.

The J train proceeds east to the unsheltered Alabama Avenue station.

The L train heads to stations unknown by most New Yorkers.

Canarsie–Rockaway Parkway is the terminus of the tracks and a trolley once continued south the the Canarsie Pier.

A long time ago.

To the east the L train dives underground on the journey to Manhattan.

The platforms were wintry last week.

But now it's spring.

Even at Broadway Junction.