The World Doesn’t Want Me Anymore, and It Doesn’t Know It
I am the corner and the cab’s glow-up roof.
A tuba and air synth march down Stanton St.
Do a rhumba for an espresso foam by the green lights.
Notice how this dude in the yellow pants is embarrassing himself.
Trying their best to dougie to “My Favorite Things”
And a sexy woman poured-into jeans twirl-a-whirls.
When we see what we were in New York
And what we leave behind
Only stay human is great
Leave your weakness in a jar.
Copyright © 2013 by Sean Singer . Used with permission of the author. This poem appeared in Poem-a-Day on March 18, 2013. Browse the Poem-a-Day archive.
“This poem is set in New York‘s Lower East Side. The title is taken from a drawing by Pier Paolo Pasolini, the poet and filmmaker. The subject of the poem is a YouTube video (http://youtu.be/RV86-W01h5w) of Jonathan Batiste’s Stay Human Band marching through the Lower East Side, gathering a crowd, as they play their instruments—a melodica, a trombone, a tuba, and a tambourine. The form is five mostly end-stopped couplets.”