SLAM!

Returning

Stepping out of the cab
a blast of moist, stale air
blows up from the subway grate,
attempting to snatch the twenty
I am nonchalantly trying to toss
at the driver as the next fare
jumps into my barely vacated seat.

I've grown soft in my years away,
so the stench of this place
is a shock, though familiar,
as is the honk of the cabbie
who, in spite of the generous tip
I just gave him, now impatiently
nudges me out of his way
with a blast of his horn.

I laugh, for he knows my secret –
the City is not mine anymore,
it belongs to someone else.
Perhaps to that woman
in the black Armani suit
who doesn't break stride
as she steps over the legs
of the homeless man
sprawled in front of the door
she is entering –
or to that bicycle messenger
weaving his way through traffic,
iPod so loud I can hear each note
of what passes for music these days,
drowning out the symphony
all around him.

The scream of a siren
snaps me back into place
as I ease into the flow
of bodies heading downstream,
and, like a spawning salmon,
I once again go against the flow,
heading north, toward the Park.

Returning  (13+) Spring SLAM! 2006 - Round 2 - Big City Prompt #1094880 by Sophy