“A metaphysical compass, a refrain, an unyielding ethos in which to believe,/no longer reserved for near misses with the vehicular minions of the MTA,/I have come to regard existence as nothing more/than this pull between hesitation and action”
Part One: “Give me the streets of Manhattan!” – Walt Whitman
Yellow cabs rush by in a vibrant Crayola streak as we linger on the corner,
a Doppler Effect pledging bodily injury
if I take even one step away from the curb.
Let’s go, commands my sister—
a native Manhattanite, taking pity on her sheltered suburban sibling
by housing her for this weekend getaway—
as the stoplight flashes green.
The traffic, a force, a battering ram, the anthropomorphic antagonist in this quest to Duane Reed,
continues to blitz
unrelenting
drivers from all five boroughs attempting to turn left
between an undulating throng of pedestrians.
The exhaust is gritty in my teeth;
feverish air swirls behind each car like a wake.
My sister, my history, my blood, charges into the fray of Teslas and SUVs,
Joan of Arc headed into an epic melee with flag and sword aloft.
I wait, hesitant, flooded with angst;
Zeno’s Paradox, and I cannot take a single step
so I cannot take a single step, so I cannot take a single step.
My sister, my history, my blood, hellbent on the opposite corner, is a woman on a mission,
unwaveringly committed to crossing this intersection,
Ernest Shackleton traversing the frozen expanse.
Finally, stasis broken, I hurry to join
and it takes only a millisecond to nearly be wiped out by a bus.
The squeal emanating from my vocal cords can only be heard by dogs
as I dodge vehicles at a sprint,
laser-focused on the safety of the sidewalk far across the street.
I am suddenly ten years old, headed for the security of home base
during a frenzied game of freeze tag.
And my sister, my history, my blood, just as she did throughout a tumultuous childhood,
comes back to usher me through the trauma of New York City at rush hour.
You hesitate, you die, she scolds,
and though I am unaware at the time,
I have just been blessed with a new mantra for life.
Part Two: “My humanity is a constant self-overcoming.” – Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
You hesitate, you die, and it isn’t only for crossing streets in the city;
you hesitate, you die, so why do we hesitate at all?
Darwin said it first (because we don’t talk about Wallace),
but it has always been the case;
ever since anaerobic prokaryotes were stuffing themselves with Carbon
at the beginning of space and time.
It’s Natural Selection, babe, and if you hesitate, you die;
survive with the fittest or get left behind,
because evolution really doesn’t give a f*ck.
But Nietzsche said it, too,
when he first birthed the Übermensch from the tip of his pen,
urging us to ascend to our power through the power of sheer will alone.
You hesitate, you die, was his favorite theme, and he wasn’t wrong about it at all;
so get on and carpe the f*cking diem already.
Climbing the corporate ladder? You hesitate, you die.
Buying concert tickets online? You hesitate, you die.
Contestant on a quiz show? You hesitate, you die.
Breaking up your estranged soulmate’s wedding? You hesitate, you die.
Capturing anything that truly matters in this, our single shot at life in this f*cked-up world?
You hesitate, you die.
A metaphysical compass, a refrain, an unyielding ethos in which to believe,
no longer reserved for near misses with the vehicular minions of the MTA,
I have come to regard existence as nothing more
than this pull between hesitation and action,
this juxtaposition between reluctance and death.
You hesitate, you die,
and I’ve stayed alive since my brush with NYC traffic—
I’ve experienced joy and triumph and the high of overcoming—
thanks to my conviction
that there are only two choices to be made at any given time;
that if we are not moving forward, we are essentially standing still,
and the only logical consequence is to be left behind.
You hesitate, you die, so I hesitate no longer,
conquering instead the human, all-too-human urge to delay;
and now I am also much less of a liability
when lucky enough to walk the grid of Manhattan once again.
Shannon Frost Greenstein (She/They) resides in Philadelphia with her children and soulmate. She is the author of The Wendigo of Wall Street, a novella forthcoming with Emerge Literary Press. Shannon is a former Ph.D. candidate in Continental Philosophy and a multi-time Pushcart Prize nominee. Her work has appeared in McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, Pithead Chapel, Bending Genres, and elsewhere. Shannon was recently a finalist for the Ohio State University Press Journal Non/Fiction Prize. Follow her on X @ShannonFrostGre
