NEW YORK TRAIN STATION

From the commuter window,

stars burn blue holes in a bluer

firmament, a map my hand’s

veined one mirrors.

The train stops and starts,

punctuates my arrhythmia.

Doomed to travel

without arriving, till small oval faces click

into view under the platforms' dim lights,

trench coats, boots, the ambivalent stares.

Their apartments could be mine.

I will stand on any step and knock.

A door swings open,

the heavenly music surprises me.

I enter without being invited.

Ann Robinson's work has appeared in American Literary Review, Coe Review, Compass Rose, Connecticut Review, Diverse Voices Quarterly, The GW Review, Fourteen Hills, Freshwater, Natural Bridge, New York Quarterly, Passager, Poet Lore, The Portland Review, RiverSedge, Sanskrit, Schuylkill Valley Journal, Spoon River Poetry Review, Weave Magazine; Willow Review, and Zone 3, among others.