Eurydice 57th Street-Seventh Avenue Nowhere Near Carnegie Hall. By John Greiner

Dead lost and not 

knowing the note 

to be got, they're

the ones that 

always have 

a song to sound, 

if not to sing

on the subway

platform

when the train

is somewhere 

so far beyond

that it's gone

behind the very

thought of time.

The desperation

call to all 

and sundry.

They've got

a movie scenario

of what's to happen 

in their heads,

the well worn play;

the star is born,

found and made icon.

We're a country quick

to take fairytales 

for facts

never having 

heard Philomel's

jug jug call.

I came down

the stairs with no

Orpheus

in my dreams.

I came down 

the stairs with only

the N train on my mind.

and now I've got

another failed 

bossa nova boy

looking to take

me for a ride.

Plug my ears

for the trip 

from Hades to 

all the anywheres;

Brooklyn to Manhattan

to Queens.

If you've got no voice to sing

then I've got no need to hear.

I'm not lost

I just don't know

how I'm going to go.

If you've got

a song, sing it,

don't put on a show.

I know

the notes

and I know

how to hit them.

Orpheus is gone

and the subway train

is so far along

that it's forever behind.

Orpheus is gone.

The air is dead.

I know why he turned around.

I know why I stayed behind.

Orpheus is gone.

I don't need

your off-key melody.

John Greiner is a Pushcart Prize nominated writer living in Queens, NY. He was educated at the New School for Social Research.  Greiner's work has appeared in Sand, Empty Mirror, Sensitive Skin, Unarmed, Street Valueand numerous other magazines. His chapbooks, broadsides and collections of poetry and short stories includeTurnstile Burlesque (Crisis Chronicles Press, 2017), The Laundrymen(Wandering Head Press, 2016), Bodega Roses (Good Cop/Bad Cop Press, 2014),Modulation Age (Wandering Head Press, 2012), Shooting Side Glances(ISMs Press, 2011) and Relics From a Hell’s Kitchen Pawn Shop (Ronin Press, 2010).