80s New York, arriving from
some sleepy town with a
suitcase, a little money,
and the audacity to make a
life for yourself.
To be young in the wake of
a city inventing its own future,
to be part of the noise before
it became nostalgia-
Just like, how wonderful
it would have been to live in
19th century London when
science was rearranging
the furniture of the world,
and the Industrial Revolution
was teaching humanity
new ways to be exhausted-
To witness history before
it knew it was history-
Like how Paris brewed when
French Revolution was busy
deciding who deserved a head
and who deserved a statue.
or how Renaissance in Italy
could place you beside
Michelangelo to tell him
the proportions were wrong.
Imagine being Cairo while
the pyramids were rising,
watching thousands of men
move stones for a king
who had mistaken his mortality
for a public works project.
Or how about Harappa when
a contractor was using
poor quality material to lay
straight-broad roads.
Or just be in Badami when
Pulakeshi defeated king Harsha
on the banks of Narmada.
But anyways, in every era
there would be a lonely guy
like me wondering about wrong
things out of boredom.
Like someone in the past
wondering about Flying Cars
of future or machines that
talk to them to avoid
socializing.