fallen leaves discarded
into a pile like playing cards nobody wants
in a midnight poker game
leaves old dreams they be
broken and crushed into little pieces
that people step on mindlessly
they’re forgotten by their parents just laying there
in the bleak air, a chill beyond chills
an all-star chill
a chill for the books
a whip’n chill
leaves no longer dancing in the wind
but instead an out of step funeral march
Chopin on an out of tune piano minus pallbearers
ambivalent like cold northern wind blows
scittering and scritching and scattering running across the street
blowing into piles next to the walls of abandoned textile mills
that once hummed Beethoven industrial symphonies
now with faded paint scratched on the outside walls
and dark windows, some boarded up, some with broken glass
all with a helplessness and the good days are gone sadness
opto-mistic red brick now gave up brown
wrecking ball ready—or ready
to be subdivided and turned into a trendy bar
with ultra hip young people misspending their youth
or a coffee house with people staring at their laptops
while they nurse espressos- cappuccinos- frappuccinos
grandes talls english breakfast tea- green tea- cinnamon dolce cremes
so they don’t have to go home to empty apartments
decorated with thick plush loneliness
and ear splitting quiet
