1950 A window in time

© 2009 David Wainland

 Traffic lights chirping like crickets

two blocks away the el rumbles

Cars beep and belch carbon

in-between kids play marbles

A non-imposing concrete courtyard

doubles as a stoop ball field

Red brick darkened by coal smoke

grey mortar crumbling with age

Iron fire escapes rusting in the rain

lobby of cracked tile and parked strollers

Six floors, no elevator

twelve landings, brown doors

Decades of paint shaded by

years of cigarettes and cigars

Radios blaring through unlocked doors

neighbors keep us safe

Small three-room apartment

with an entrance hallway,

Phone table and dumbwaiter

narrow eat-in kitchen

Two open living room windows

my mother's eyes to the street

So she can watch me dance

through open hydrants of water

In the winter a radiator

to keep us warm, sometimes

Dry our snow gloves and scarves

in summer, an extra shelf

Mingling food odors

from apartment to apartment

Lasagna from the first floor

chicken soup in ours

Five people, one bedroom

my folks in the front

We kids sleep in the back

it was our home