from Streets. Museums by Nick Benson

these two men who were well acquainted were 
talking to each other, each in
his own hole

in the pavement
actually drilled into the substrata
comfortably leaning against the sides,

and smoking cigarettes -- well, one was -- the other
had a tall rasta hat -- cig smoker had 
an orange hard hat

tilted to the side, over
copious dreads
and around them, work was going on, or it appeared

some weren't taking their break --
a large white dude emerged
from an adjacent manhole and bounded

dangerously across the mouth
of a diner dragging cord perhaps
cheerfully? the crumbling earth didn't

collapse, the bright lights fixed
it all into place as passersby
passed by. How I would've liked

to listen forever to that space
that human station sculpted
from the debris of Seventh 

north of Fourteenth
in crushing repose, 
the city's long wick lit 

under our nose