Riverside

I.
“Don’t go to parks at night,” my mother said.
But what’s a park? We sat on the fence above
Riverside after dark, by the playground, dog
walkers, baby walkers, grass, trees, mosquitos.
“This is not a park,” said Amber.

II.
To solve the riddle, “what is a park,” I climbed
the stairs down to the Riverside (definitely) Park.
A woman in breast cancer pink pushed a dog
in a baby stroller. A sign pointed left: “no beer,”
down: “no beer,” right: “beer.”

III.
A bicyclist asked another, “Will I be able to love?
I’m not sure my heart can do that.” In a muscle
beach a lonely athlete did leg lifts in the sand.
Across the highway, Amber planted a sign
between the river rocks: “Park.”









Rebecca Landau is a junior at Columbia University. Her work has appeared in Hanging Loose Press, the 826 Valencia Quarterly and Talking Writing among others. While not reading or writing, she is usually busy procrastinating.