Eleventh Street

Eleventh Street is quiet. The buildings are brick, two and three stories. In the air, here and there, small slanted writing hangs with nothing holding it up.

Over a hydrant: (someone will find a dime here and leave it). Over a woman on a bus bench: (she is not waiting for the bus). Over the curb by a shop with its shutters down: (someone will sit here later to shake a stone out of a shoe).

People walk through the lines, and the lines close behind them. An opening parenthesis hangs in front of your face. You step around it. The woman on the bench does not look up.

Halfway down the block a door stands open in a brick front, under 1886 in iron numerals and a sign that says VINTAGE.