Staten Island Tugboats

Two parties depart on a trip. One to the west and one to the east. We begin a long day of biking to the southern tip of Staten Island. Passing homes of the rich and shameless. Met a mechanic named Mark in Bushwick who told me he did the pipes at Ol-Dirty's house on Staten. Said O.D.B. walked in and threw a bag of coke down on the table and said, "Are you the plumber? Have a tip?"

Biking through Green Point and over the Manhattan bridge for a change. Chinatown merchants sell rambutans to tourists jaywalking just to fit in. Skimming the Hudson on a ferry with South American blue seats etched with names of lovers and french kissing teenagers. Sea gulls ride turbulent bursts and driftwood sink in the wavelengths of the wave lengths. We empty tallcans hugged by tidy brown bags before departing and pet a drug-dog named Teddy. He sniffs and sniffs and blows nobodies house down.

Three hours later we empty more tall cans still tidy in neatly folded brown bags. American flagged murals line every block while the people of Staten seem to love well defined biceps. We bike endlessly, around the east while our other party skims the west to meet at a graveyard with gravity folded tombstones reading dates two centuries prior.

We discover a secret passage behind the graves of larger maritime graves, each delicately tucked in by muddy blankets and mosquito wings. Our dirty feet levitate then sink into the lowtide swamp surface. Levitate then sink repeatedly. We storm the ships. Walk planks of found wood. Place secret notes on sinking steel. And the sun grows pink on the silhouettes of Newark's rigid industry. Two parties depart to the city. One goes to the west and one to the east.