I AM CHICAGO
And
like an old lover you return to me,
roll
over me, into me.
You
inhale my many spices
embrace
my spidery arms of fog,
and
feel safe in my cocoon.
You
frolic on my green vistas
and
wash away your grime
in
the waters of my lake.
My many
veins carry you to and fro,
to the
very outskirts of my borders.
Did
you miss me? My music?
The
swelling notes of Bach,
The
warbled blues,
Hard
rock, hot jazz,
My
hum, my growl, my heartbeat?
Did
you miss the many colors of my seasonal hats?
My
winter coats not always white and sterile?
My
explosions of colors on a hot summer day?
My
spiraling towers sun bathed before dipping
into
the night's thousand other illuminations?
You
did not miss my darker side I know
The
wailing sirens summoned by an angry shot
Fleeting
footsteps, a cry for help, the stink of fear
That
too is life, my life
I
know the homeless hustle for a buck
and
sex is sold as love
but
through it all I shine
and
lure you back as I know I could
for
I am Chicago.
For such a dynamic city, it's amazing to be that, as a muse, it has hardly changed in a century. I think it's impossible to read this without recalling Carl Sandburg's "Chicago."
ReplyDeleteHog Butcher for the World,
Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat,
Player with Railroads and the Nation's Freight Handler;
Stormy, husky, brawling,
City of the Big Shoulders:
They tell me you are wicked and I believe them, for I have seen your painted women under the gas lamps luring the farm boys.
And they tell me you are crooked and I answer: Yes, it is true I have seen the gunman kill and go free to kill again.
And they tell me you are brutal and my reply is: On the faces of women and children I have seen the marks of wanton hunger.
And having answered so I turn once more to those who sneer at this my city, and I give them back the sneer and say to them:
Come and show me another city with lifted head singing so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning.
Flinging magnetic curses amid the toil of piling job on job, here is a tall bold slugger set vivid against the little soft cities;
Fierce as a dog with tongue lapping for action, cunning as a savage pitted against the wilderness,
Bareheaded,
Shoveling,
Wrecking,
Planning,
Building, breaking, rebuilding,
Under the smoke, dust all over his mouth, laughing with white teeth,
Under the terrible burden of destiny laughing as a young man laughs,
Laughing even as an ignorant fighter laughs who has never lost a battle,
Bragging and laughing that under his wrist is the pulse, and under his ribs the heart of the people,
Laughing!
Laughing the stormy, husky, brawling laughter of Youth, half-naked, sweating, proud to be Hog Butcher, Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat, Player with Railroads and Freight Handler to the Nation.
Or his "Fog."
The fog comes
on little cat feet.
It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.