Sleet Not Expected to End                                    
 
Dark all day.  Wet.  Squalls are strong-
arming rain into sleet.  Bullets of ice
calibrated to penetrate asap. Sudden
let-up silhouettes a woman struggling
to say upright.  Kids look to be hers.  
Boy maybe 4,  girl, maybe 6.  Hard
to tell.   See a doctor scrawl Question
survive.  Now big-eyed and street-wise
stick figures step in others' steps,
take their chances   Doesn't  help
passing thunderheads are seeding
pellets.  Hatched shadows cross against
a hoar-frosted light.  Flapflapflap
rap soles between slips and slides.  
All of us stumble, slide,  try to right.   
Feet and noses numb as lightning Z's
Zoro-like between corner buildings.
Don't let reflected light fool.  Meet
the Prince of Darkness.  Soul so charred,  
neither ice nor human can revive.  
Sees petals once gold freeze to the sunken
cheeks of a 6-year-old, laughs and packs
wet snow around a rock.   Sleet is blinding,
but those pants she has on are Men's.  
Cut off, but still she trips. Mom helps her up.
Boy slogs on,  his cowlick an inverted icicle
or diamond stalagmite.  Most of the down
has leaked from his jacket.  Mom's coat
doesn't button or zip.   Fished from a bin
says Help.  Brrrr.  Frankenstein's-monster-
stiff, but aliiiiiiive.  Aliiiiiiii. . .oh no.
Red neon Coffee.  Good and Hot.  Smell wafts
as the door swings.  Holiday'd windows
with white fur mullions show Cheshires
over forksful of eggs.  Butter drips.
Soul for a doughnut.   Crunch a cop's shoes.  
Shelter's down that way.  Stomp-stomp.
Person could freeze on a night like this.
 
 
 
(c)  Phyllis Jean Green, 2006