Poem: The Bars Closed / So Are We

Most mornings, I rouse myself—

today, the clock glares at 4:22,

propped up in my temple-bed.

Mornings always feel so hard,

but I’m determined—

I fish for clothes in the hamper

and push myself out into bleak, wet Queens.

You know, after 4 AM is a switch point:

New York City’s bars have closed,

spilling a puddle of people

onto the damp streets—

Megan, all curves on Roosevelt Avenue,

and denizens of the club,

shouting loudly and hugging each other

in their glaring halter tops

and early spring jerseys—

like completing a ritual, inebriated but satisfied,

reluctant to return

to whatever fragile domesticity waits.

I’m with them—

just trying to catch a train.

And in that crowd,

something inside me steadies,

as though I’ve found a handle

on the world for a moment,

glad not to be alone

in my own head.

By the time I meet Joshua at Penn Station,

I’m more myself,

a quiet song building in my mind.

He’s already awake,

his T-shirt too tight but somehow easy on him.

I grin at how polite he is

to the train attendant,

asking where coach class is—

I could have told him,

but I’m busy weaving stories

in my head, barely hearing him say,

“I’m glad you’re with me.”