To be a body among other bodies

Sure sign of the season departing: one last gift
of summer, lone fruit purpling, still clinging

to the tree. On the ground, leathered skins
of leaves that could not keep from shedding.

It’s hard enough to be a body among other
bodies, to walk the streets, descend

the stairs; to ride in trains, swaying, hanging on
to straps. The world accelerates past flickering

windows. Life is that indifferent engine humming,
hurrying us toward the next thing and the next.

I close my eyes and think— should the wheels
disengage from the tracks, being one among

so many other bodies, how would I manage
the certain panicked rush toward the exit

signs, a stairwell leading back to safety?
In the city, my body moving among other bodies

barely reflects the light that glints
like fire from rows of perforated windows.

How we must look from up high: dark, grainy
forms, indistinguishable to some cold eye.

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