Granby Row, 5 a.m.
Half a million people here and still
this hour finds a way to be deserted,
or whatever's on the other side of deserted,
what it is when a place is haunted
by all that's yet to arrive.
I am the only one alive,
the rest subsumed in shapes of buildings,
shades of bridges, or sealed in one of the cars
that now and again sail like phantoms
over clear, wide, empty streets. The sky
has no color, neither stars nor clouds,
but something makes the streetlights fade
as, on the sidewalk, bright-edged fragments
change from gold to silver
and will soon again be glass,
green and blue-green and dark, dark brown
where, days ago, a shattering startled me awake,
echoing below ferocious voices.