A City Wintertime (From 2008)

 A City Wintertime

During the winter, after departing

the 9:45, I arrive in the hustle and

bustle of Chicago, the pounding drone

of car horns, heartbeats, street songs.

The loud growls of businessmen in

the midst of a flaring tirade, young

girls in half-jeans whispering of some

foreboding new fashion, camera and eyes

of tourists shining on first, second,

countless trips to the long arms which

long for the gray sky. Their hands

cold and burned as the frozen wind

whips their scarves in time with

the wash of the falling snow. From

them are fearful looks, a worried frown,

the quiet wish that I were elsewhere.

Yet part of me is satisfied, for they

recognize my presence in this

dark world while some sit on the grounds;

forceably ripped from mother's embrace

of the collective humankind.

Who look, with the tearful eyes of

pain and suffering, so much that

my heart is wrenched with

powerful a sorrow as wonder.

Their very existence denied by

that plentiful childish ignorance.

They who sit with outstretched hands

simply waiting for the disgusted spat

the pitied toss of some bronzed coin

the infrequent proof of their halved

existence, their ears only, who hear

the unforgiving winter winds,

as they quietly crying bleak carols.