Claudia Gary
Gotham, 1970
Our city was a place
for having the whole deal:
a mini-world of stone
with libraries and parks
that never disappointed,
with brick-and-mortar stores
and restaurants along
each avenue and street,
and with an art museum
where any teenage girl
could embrace coloured light
on weekends and write poems
of water lilies, perched
in Monet’s window seat
as if the larger world
and this one were the same.