A Bushwick Villanelle

A clean sun shines over St. Nick’s and Harman street,

welcoming a spring of transformation and glee,

Mounds of snow a memory, forgotten the sleet.


Soon it’s sweltering, a summer we barely greet,

yet it brings a new chapter, an existence free:

a clean sun shines over St. Nick’s and Harman street.


Occupation is soon found, not missing a beat;

a routine as all leaves wither and leave the tree;

Mounds of snow a memory, forgotten the sleet.


As autumn cools, it’s despair, anger and deceit

outside; yet we subsist on love, and art, and tea;

a clean sun shines over St. Nick’s and Harman street.


Complacency broken by appalling results.

we steel ourselves, patience and wisdom are the key.

Mounds of snow a memory, forgotten the sleet.


This winter of the soul and earth, valiant we’ll meet,

together we stand, for our own we cannot flee.

A clean sun shines over St. Nick’s and Harman street.

Mounds of snow a memory, forgotten the sleet