Neighbours

Carl Sandburg

On Forty First Street 
near Eighth Avenue 
a frame house wobbles. 
  
If houses went on crutches 
this house would be
one of the cripples. 
  
A sign on the house: 
Church of the Living God 
And Rescue Home for Orphan Children. 
  
From a Greek coffee house
Across the street 
A cabalistic jargon 
Jabbers back. 
  And men at tables 
  Spill Peloponnesian syllables       
  And speak of shovels for street work. 
  And the new embankments of the Erie Railroad 
  At Painted Post, Horse’s Head, Salamanca.