Chicago In January

Branches drip with snow and moisture,  
touch the night sky.  
 
Chicago can be so cold  
pigeons pray for sun  
at 2 a.m.  
on tracks  
that shouldn't be able to support anything.  
 
Chimney smoke form clouds  
speeding northeast ahead of schedule  
past the houses, the parked cars  
the conductors, the imaginary passengers.  
 
Streetlights guide the train  
down a platform of expanding perspective,  
deep reds and oranges flicker  
on mixing boards created from kitchens  
that smell of Polish food.  
 
There is a difference in the way  
a man panhandles for a fix  
or because he is not sure  
he will not freeze to death  
that night.  
 
Hunger is in the whites of the eyes  
where he only sees the 12 degrees  
on the automated bank sign  
                           or  
the negative account balance  
imprinted in his head.  
 
He only sees  
the warmth of buzzing porch lights  
                                   or  
his frozen heart  
shattered all over the sidewalk.