20130530.0748

I have become a red line rider,
Following number 2 through the tunnels
From intake in Brooklyn,
Best of the boroughs,
To output in Midtown.
If it makes Manhattan
A toilet,
A swirling mass of byproduct to be flushed away,
It is not the only thing that makes it so.
I have smelled the smell of Herald Square's subway station in the summertime,
Smelled it full of human waste and wasted humanity,
And what Martin's Starks say is not going to be true for a while yet.
What do I add to it?
What do I take from it?
What exchange between me
And the shoving Asimovian masses
As I make my way in The City?
What do any of us do in such a place
Other than mill about,
Cattle in a feed lot
(As was once described to me,
Although I do not remember who did so,
And I am sorry for it)?

If we are so bovine as that
(And we likely are),
Then where is the slaughterhouse
For which we are surely bound?
Who will be the butcher?
Who will eat the steaks we become?

Will I, at least, make a decent brisket?