In 1975-76 I experienced the rigors of spending my first American winter in Rochester, NY,
and that moved me to pen the following poem:
Dead of winter upstate –
And skeletal trees stand
Stark upon the penitent land
Scaped by human hand
With a criss-cross of ways –
Park-, Express-, Thru-, Free-.
An unseasonable thaw –
And scurrying sidewalkers thresh
The melting sleet and slush
Into a goulash of chill, wet mush
That numbs the toes
And soils the Missus’ maxis
And the Master’s leggings
And boosts the dry-cleaning industry.
Another cold snap –
And scary, glassy skid-tracks trap
The unwary road-rider
Into a dizzying one-hundred-and-eighty-degree spin
That leaves their quarry senseless in
A steel-fashioned Juggernaut
Destined to become a rusting heap
In an anonymous used-car lot.
Copyright © Azim Lewis Mayadas 2014