Excerpts from “the clearing”

brooklyn street under subway

By Xandi McMahon


walking down broadway

where in this beyond are they taking me?1

the rickety old tin-can car approaches its stop running mid-october breeze over the platform. at the broadway bridge we scream. loudly, freely, there is no reason not to. take us into sherman creek park and down harlem river drive. east to west we hold this narrow island. and

my eye—which rests only on beauty—holds            you (i don’t desire much else.) 2

the hundreds of streets escape into my calves and the muscles of my back. heaps of orange and brown we fall into the full family of it all. out of nowhere it becomes dark. enter rats!

at battery park we are silent. some amazement of joy that we had found our way out that far.3

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