On Cities

Concrete mountain, dank murky pool
Frozen wooden hovels
and a view of nothing
Morass of crushing cultures and sediment
Tumbleweeds blow through the post-midnight alleys
and look out for the knives
or just a punch in the face
Two-bit towns and overpaid dreams
fighting for the thinning air
There was a time when,
trekking across the continent,
I envisioned a different reality
But all that greeted me were other seekers
in the welfare line expecting handouts
Crammed into sardine-cans
holding down any job they could pin themselves to,
living off tips of the leftovers of overpriced pints
Where are they now?
Success, failure, one step forward and two steps back
I passed by all of them like a ghost,
not even seeing where I was,
haunting only my own past
The world is the world is the world
One and one is one
My path is your path is not your path is not my path
And every city is the same
Take the labels off, shuffle the people around
It's all the same
Grow some trees, shave off some mountains
Snow, rain, hot or cold
It's all the same
Swahili, Malay, Quechua
Urban suburban pan-urban un-urban post-urban
Wherever it is you're going,
just take a look -
someone else is going the other way,
looking for the same thing.