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Satori On a Rainy Night
by Carole Bugge
Looking out my window at the clear droplets sliding slowly down the panes
For a moment, the veil lifts
The illusion of separation falls away like a discarded husk
And I am suddenly me, but not me:
I am the cab driver wearily winding up his late night shift
longing for lamb biryani, or perhaps chicken kurma
the restaurant worker sleepily stacking chairs on the rain-slicked patio
half-dreaming of his father’s house in Guatemala
the insomniac in Apartment 3D,
his eyes wary and watchful as he scans the cable channels for reports of disasters
the late night dog walker dipping out into the drizzle to sneak a cigarette
smoking furtively under the elms that guard Riverside Drive
I am the worried mother in 12H nursing a feverish child
sighing lullabies through sleepy eyes
and the bored doorman in the lobby
who wants only to feel his sweetheart’s hair brushing across his chest
as her body arches over him
skin on skin
I am the all-night watchman at Rockefeller Center
whose eyes shine as he sits in his basement cubicle
glad to be awake while the city sleeps all around him
his shift punctuated by a call to his daughter
she is away at school, and her voice soothes him like a soft hand on his brow
I am the subway conductor reporting in at two a.m.,
carrying his lunch in a soggy brown paper bag
his wife packed it standing over the stove,
her breasts heavy with milk in the blue terrycloth robe
pressing her belly into the counter
the same belly that gave him three proud sons
his love for her fills his chest as he eats his Cubano sandwich
on thick white bread, savory with garlic, pork and pickles
I read of this moment
the sages sang of it – and now it arrives, so simple, so clear
as though I had lived with it always inside of me
the same rain coats us all with its benediction
like a cloak draping itself over the city
I see it now
We belong to each other
I am my enemies, and they are me
I am the Brooklyn Ferry
Long live the Common Man
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