Here on the darkness of this city street, we can hear the sorrow of piano keys, like the flutter of wings, unlocking the cold of life’s throes, if we close our eyes and listen, we can hear the drum of pounding feet, of our hero running toward us in the falling rain, soaked and freezing, singing to the top of his lungs, “Your sins into me, Oh my beautiful one,” he sings, running straight past us, “Your sins into me,” running, we turn and watch, a blur of color on a colorless night, splintered by the blood of heaven and electric halos of light, and the girl, she’s coming up on the left, locked away in a building, on the ground floor, so safe behind bars, behind bars, so defenseless, and so our hero runs, straight past the 77th Precinct, his feet pounding against the sidewalk, his boots splashing the muckholes of God, and running, running, running, fluttering in the darkness like a psychotic butterfly, he will beg for her forgiveness, and on his heels, the sins will splash into our face, and if we want to, we can feel them, all of them, melting off of him, here in the darkness we can try to understand, all of them, spilling away as he runs, as he makes room, and as he runs, we can listen to the beat of his heart, follow the rhythm of suffering thumping like a jungle drum, “Your sins into me,” our hero sings, “Oh my beautiful one,” he sings, “Your sins into me,” and up ahead, one city block, a man staggers out of a bar, followed by another, and another, in a quivering organization of chaos, pushing and shoving, and laughing in the rain, and if one man falls, so will another, and into the gutter they both will tumble, eyes dilated, with cigarettes poised in the air, directly in the path of a speeding taxi, one man sits, while the other sobers up in the headlight glare, and climbs to his feet, fluttering to safety in the cold of life’s throes, while the taxi driver, fiddling with his radio dial, distracted by the EAS announcement over the airwaves, is oblivious to the silver and cold, to our hero running and running, like the flutter of wings, leaping into the gutter, pushing the drunkard out of harm’s way, absorbing his stupor, swallowing the carcinoma in his liver with one simple touch, and, smiling, he takes the impact of the taxi head-on, bending at the grill, cracking against the windshield in a spiderweb of glass, flipping end over end, crumpling across the roof, the trunk, smacking and rolling onto the pavement splattered with rain and blood, of happiness and sadness, of life and death, of sin and repentance, of forgiveness and love, and the men on the sidewalk, lost on life’s throes, won’t realize what happened, nor will the driver, though for the former, the lungs are as clean as a newborn’s, free from various tars and by-products, and the latter, the damage to his car disappears right before his eyes, metal retaking its original shape, broken glass coming back together, and they won’t know what happened, for by the time they look up with clearly distorted eyes, the street will once again be empty, playing only the sorrow of piano keys dancing along the raindrops, but the rhythm of pain is still beating, like the flutter of wings, undaunted, running and running, begging for her forgiveness, for our hero, he looks up, closes his eyes against the rain, and he can feel it, opening his eyes, he can see it, the white fire in the sky, the falling nuclear star, shooting toward the earth, and our hero, he outstretches his arms, singing, “Oh my beautiful one, your sins into me,” and falling, racing, shooting through the wind and the rain, all of our sins melt and bleed away, making room, and the missile impacts the heart of the city in a beautiful bloom of fire and heat and radiation, and our hero runs, arms outstretched, into the fallout, hoping against faith, rising and falling, sailing and sinking, against this burst of fiery judgment, against all that she is, against all the he was, against all that we are, and he runs into it, wrapping himself in silver and cold, singing against the deafening waves of destruction, shouting, crying, “Your sins into me."