there's no way around it

streets of

crusted black snow,

under the amber

blink,

greyed

and pocked

with the fumes of traffic,

dirty

like the wet rags

of a

a dishwasher in Times

Square

circa

1964.

the heaves of it.

the blockade of it.

unplowed,

the weakly shoveled.

the lines of 

civility blurred.

it's every man

woman and child

to their

own ways

of crossing, until spring.