Smoke curling from a dirty stack joins an already darkened sky
O’er junkyards laced with debris, cluttered with discard that’s piled eye high,
Mixed with the acrid smell of factories still grinding out their wares
As last years lights sag soot covered now from all Our Lady’s fairs.
A pidgeon’s roost has spread into a hovel on the roof with time
Midst makeshift lines where meager laundry’s hung to whiten in the grime.
Her aged structures seem to weep and groan with some unknown despair
Amid the bleak facades of each building’s ruff begging groom and care.
A city’s that place where the clamor of life parades in the streets
And the courtesy of her scoundrels leer at each corner she greets.
Here and there scaffolds rise in man’s weak attempt at human repair
While a furtive pack of stray dogs darts through shadows that loom and stare.
The sky above the city simmers with a glaze akin to glass
As she waits for the heat of a torrid summer’s day to slow pass.
Her neon lights glitter like garnets set into a bloodred moon,
Even her morning’s dew glistens and weeps and disappears too soon.
Imagine the day to day drama that her back alleys must hold
And the dreams of generations that here wearied and soon grew old.
Forgotten and lost dwells mankind’s dignity in the city’s rush
Like battered aspirations or prayers whispered in a chapel’s hush.
As a matter of need most cities are built like the hub of a wheel
The closer you are to its center the more of its impact you feel.
Claire V. Bogdanos 