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It is a quarter to ten
At night
And an ice cream truck just drove by
A cheerful tintinnabulation
Ringing through the sultry air
Still rising from the city's streets.
There are not many places
Where such happens,
But there are any such things
That happen
Here.

It is a thing to think on,
That such things happen.
The theater of the absurd plays out
On sidewalks
And in the streets
Every day and night
Here.

Cheek by jowl
We crowd together
Here,
And we are yet set apart from one another,
Walled off by will more than by any physical barrier
(For there are few such barriers)
For those who must ride the subways,
Their sweating bare skins pressed together
In contact otherwise intimate
And still too often genital),
But surrounded by all manner of strangeness
If we but look to see.

I wonder if people refuse to look,
To hear,
Because it *is* so strange
And to see or hear such strangeness
Is to take it into the self.
Remaining as one is is hard
Here
Because there are so many selves
And they think themselves the only selves
Worth attention
Worth consideration
Worth being
Here.

Is it any wonder that such absurdities,
Banal and otherwise,
Pervade the surroundings to be found
Here?