Lower Manhattan Pantoum

Always a bad sign
people on the sidewalk looking up.
A crowd forms, cars slow
then stop,

people on the sidewalk looking up.
I step into the pool of them
then stop.
I gape like the others.

I step into the pool of them,
become the pool
and gape like the others.
Mothers, peddlers, suits

become the pool
of a wreck.
Mothers, peddlers, suits,
my super, my neighbors,

a wreck
unfolding, undone.
My super, my neighbors,
no one is not stunned.

Unfolding, undone,

we look at our watches,
stunned.
Someone says let’s pray.

We examine our watches.

A crowd forms. Cars stop.
Someone says let’s pray –
always a bad sign.

"Lower Manhattan Pantoum" first appeared in Poetry, May 2005, Volume CLXXXVI, Number 2, and on the website Poetry Daily.