I have come to believe that shoveling snow
Is the only science I ever studied enough
To turn into an art.

Standing, staring out the window at the
Windblown snow I can see the patterns
At the end of things. My tires are still visible
And that means it is one less thing
I will have to dig out in the morning

But I see the tumors growing
On the sidewalk, all of them huge
White misshapen mounds
And I feel the age in my bones and
The apprehension in my soul

I hefted shovels with fire in the
Day, and threw the offending
Blizzards into my front yard
Arguing, rightly, that by spring
The pristine snow would help
To green the lawn

Now I know I will only entomb
My balloon Santa and his reindeer
And my neighbor will build
An Everest of his own next to mine
And we will not see the grass again ‘til March

As for my unplowed streets
Here in the land of
The bridge and tunnel peasantry:
The Lord High Mayor, the billionaire,
Seems weary of the tadpoles
Who would dare question him. How is it we
Do not see that the tourists are in town
And the Broadway shows are open
And that, by God, he has first had
Plowed into blacktop the bike trails
At Prospect Park.

Stop complaining, His Worship intones
Without any ironic sense that his town house
Sits on snowless pavement, welcoming
To the high and mighty he will
Entertain on New Year’s Eve.

And beyond the beveled glass
As the champagne flutes tinkle merrily
And the very rich and famous
Laugh happily I am reminded
That in Brooklyn a newborn died
For lack of way to a hospital
And a thousand ambulances
Were stranded in a Sahara of unplowed snow

His Highness says all is well
By today but Facebook and I- phones and
The helicopters tell another story
And he says we regret and we apologize
And mistakes were made and reviews
Will discover, but not once does he use the word “I”
And not once does he promise it won’t happen again.
And again. And again.

As my shovels flies and the snow
Gets hurled into Santa’s bewildered
Face, I am thinking for the benefit of
Historians to come that if they want
To know when the blades on guillotines
Were sharpened anew and the Elite
Began their precipitous decline from
Our estimation and we remembered
Jefferson’s admonition that
A little revolution now and then is good for
The soul, they may begin their counting,
At least in New York City,
From the last week in the last month
Of the year 2010.

12/31/2010

Posted on 12/31/2010
Copyright © 2025 Ken Harnisch