Energy
a new poem
Energy
Every time I pass the Waldorf on 49th
I think of getting dressed
to Serge Gainsbourg’s “New York USA”
on the morning Bowie died
and how the Waldorf was the first hotel
to offer room service in 1931,
that window in-between both wars
when people were so broke and miserable,
they probably weren’t looking for new luxury
but tough! They got it anyway. (Why not?)
If you’re living on Earth at this moment
and scrolling through another boring video
from another boring burnout
telling you to optimize your life
like it’s a closet, it’s time
you took someone’s credit card
to the Plaza and optimized
their in-room dining where
for three-hundred and fifty American dollars
the Home Alone Sundae
can be served in your bed
at any fucking time you want.
Sixteen scoops of ice cream,
raspberry sauce, whipped cream,
maraschino cherries and a rush
that will make reading the news
feel like a weather report from Barbados.
Why would you read it anyway! Hello.
You already know what you’re getting.
“I mean, suffering is a choice,” Will tells me,
quoting Buddhism or something
as I look out at First Avenue
where Sean the painter is carrying
a windowsill and doesn’t see me
(though I do see him) and after weeks
(or months perhaps) there’s proof.
Proof that people are alive
with different haircuts
doing the same old things.
I remember cutting lines with him
years ago in some apartment in Tribeca
and how he told me money is an energy.
“You don’t really need it,” he said.
“If you have the energy, that’s all you need.”
And I’m just beginning to get that, actually,
or how painters are really poets
and poets are usually terrible painters, in fact.
And it doesn’t make sense even though
it’s exactly like money. You can buy
a lot of things in this hellscape
but energy—energy, sweetie—
you either have that or don’t.