High Line
This poem journeys along a linear park in New York, built on a historic freight rail line elevated above the “car stitched streets” of Manhattan. The poem can be found in Thimblerig.
High Line
If he were a train he would be idling,
if he were a train he would drown traffic,
if he were a train he would shed.
heavy bars of shadow onto West 16th Street,
draw the eye, shunt forward,
pick up speed, chop back room,
backyard, back street, aircon,
gutter, central heating pipe,
shutter, dark overlaying light.
He paces it out above car stitched streets:
americ- ONE WAY –no stopping anytime-
spans a subtle Hudson, snaps
ornamental grasses, railway sleepers
rearing into benches, girders and rivets
rhythms of windows and bricks,
adjuncts, angles, precincts, abutments.
Picture him on the High Line;
contained, reaching into distance.