The other day in Neukölln I saw two girls in hijab on an app-rented electric scooter, vaping, weaving the sidewalk at top speed in a candy cloud of laughter, and was frightened for them but felt at the same time that to have seen them at all was good luck.

This image of youth in a battery-powered hurry, nearly but never outracing delight, reminded me of three city images in verse, in Queens, London, and Chicago respectively, in diverse moods and forms, which I thought I would put together, just to light the series. I can think of more, and perhaps so can you. Feel free to write back with more examples. But do me a favor: don’t ask, “does this count?”—about this or anything else. Topic for another day.

Write if you’re in London, I’m there for the next week and possibly a little longer, it’s my favorite place in the world.

Peace,

Jackie

Homeboy Sandman, Satellite, 2022, https://homeboysandman-mmg.bandcamp.com/track/satellite

Seen a kid holding a wheelie on a bike without a front tire

While wearing a backpack Sneakers on a black wire

Ezra Pound, In a Station of the Metro, 1913

The apparition of these faces in the crowd:
Petals on a wet, black bough.

Ed Roberson, Ornithology, from City Eclogue, 2008