Harlem River
I find myself here again.
Few people.
Cross-legged on the ground,
wind in my hair,
a bottle of water bought for a dollar in Times Square after standing in line for too long.
Half-empty.
Music in my ears.
My right ear throbs—sharp, persistent.
Strangely, I don’t mind it.
The absurdity of pain,
the way it anchors me.
Reminds me that I am here, alive.
Faint. Fleeting.
Walking, I had been consumed by an urgent need to write.
Now that I’m sitting down,
I have no idea where to begin.
I think I have fallen in love with walking.
I don’t know if it’s because I’ve fallen in love with summer in New York,
or because I’ve fallen in love with walking alone.
Every time, aimless.
Every time, further than I intended.
Every time, until there is no road left.
Today, a strange fragility presses against my ribs.
Maybe it’s my cycle approaching.
Maybe it’s nothing.
On 6th Ave, I nearly burst into tears.
For no reason at all.
Or for reasons I can’t name.
The arrival of summer unsettles me.
A rush of something between exhilaration and panic.
I brace myself.
For the season.
For someone.
I tell myself I am facing it.
Embracing it.
So convincingly that I almost believe it.
And yet—
sometimes, relentless optimism is just another way to run.
"I am so happy."
And then, suddenly,
a great, engulfing void.
Streets hold memory.
Bryant Park.
Fifth Avenue.
Times Square.
K-town.
Broadway.
Rockefeller.
Places I have walked.
Places I have never walked.
Expectations, disappointments.
Compressed into a few city blocks.
I have walked these streets too many times,
with too many people,
choosing which memories to keep,
which to let fade.
And all at once—
they surge back.
Overwhelming.
Disjointed.
Cracking at the edges.
Someone once asked me if I would miss New York.
I hesitated before answering.
"I think so."
But maybe it’s not this place I will miss.
Maybe it’s the people,
the moments,
the feelings that lived within its streets.
And just like that—
a sudden, crushing emptiness.
I walk.
Aimless, nameless,
and inexplicably sad.
Memories of happiness surface without warning.
And then, they turn on me.
One. Two.
The flicker of car lights.
A saxophonist in the middle of a trash heap, playing for no one.
Two women drinking in their underwear.
Four pigeons fighting over a slice of pizza.
Six friends lost in conversation.
In my ears, a song plays.
"Let us decay in quiet stillness, together."