By dawn the purple cold of Canada <br />would settle into Coney Island <br />where Freeborn slept under the Boardwalk <br />bundled up with layer upon layer of clothing <br />his home a refrigerator carton <br />or a number of mattress boxes taped together. <br />He explained, “The cartons block the wind <br />so if you got enough clothes on and ain’t dead <br />your own body heats up the little space alright. <br />Hell, I’m lucky. <br />I’m the one got a right to be called Warrior.” <br />Now everyone huddled indoors: <br />in Kansas Fried Chicken, Kennedy Fried Chicken, <br />Meng’s, or Mike’s restaurant under the station <br />or in Faber’s Fascination. <br />It was good to be indoors <br />when the temperature dipped past zero <br />and the wind blasted off the awesome Atlantic. <br />In the dark <br />just the cold wind <br />having supremacy over all. <br />Then I got coffee with a free Oreo cookie <br />from Phillip’s International Toffee House <br />and watched white mist float free <br />and then from the cookie <br />which I dipped in <br />when a stray dog appeared <br />glanced up, sad brown eyes <br />seemed sad <br />so dropped the cookie <br />which he gladly took <br />seemed glad, then went on <br />this lone dog in the dead of winter <br />in Coney Island <br />with not much chance for life <br />unless he found <br />a few of his own kind <br />to travel with.<br /><br />Charles Chaim Wax<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/another-life-1/
