Window Dressing Reality
by Odin Roark

When window shopping becomes hypnotic
some will stare at Sak’s Fifth Ave. windows,
or Tiffany’s, or Lord & Taylor and wonder,
and dream.

Some will fight off depressions,
for they know they’re not part of the 1%,
as they glance at other windows,
where this fine suited broker and his glamorously dressed praying-mantis
clutching his arm ever so tightly peer intently.
These are the glitter masks of another kind,
“Better put that on my list to buy.”

Yet…

So many walk and stop at the window,
the unrecognized,
the timid store clerk,
the intern pharmacist,
the long worn out hairdresser,
his bodybuilder long past his prime,
even the exotic dancer a bit short on tricks at the moment.

And then…

There’s the blind walker, his stick relaxed,
his ears taking in the mixed emotions of the viewers,
exuding their “what if?”

Yet, like any other street,
it eventually empties,
the undertaker disappears in the fog after a long day,
the lonely waiter waits shivering for the next bus and home.

All because…

A window decorator lured the nose-to-window dreamers.

In a subway tunnel,
a dust impacted misfiring fluorescent bulb
hangs beneath rotting strands of life’s energy.

Undaunted, the homeless man turning his coins
toward the light and smiles.

He has enough for the next leg of his trip to nirvana,
getting to the Mission and a good meal.