Once, awake in a dark room
four stories above Brooklyn,
I heard, clearly, the voice
of a subway conductor
urging his passengers to be patient,
they would continue soon.
It was late – a light drizzle,
streets deserted, F train buried
deep beneath Church Avenue.
I shook the woman beside me
to ask if she had heard it too,
but all she grasped
was the bell of the doors closing,
the soft rumble
of the going away.