Christopher Roe’s most recent poem to appear here was Bell Dust (February 2015).

Sidewalk Story
By Christopher Roe

He looked down at the worn
green patinated bronze plaque
embedded in the concrete
that proudly proclaimed,
“Built by Work Projects Administration
RI 1940.” The sidewalk
was seventy-four years old.
That was two years older than him.
He looked down its concrete length
noting the many cracks and pock marks,
the heaved and buckled slabs,
the chips and scars and scattered repairs
the rough and beaten look of it
and he thought, this sidewalk is a metaphor
for my body. We’ve both been through
a lot yet somehow we’re both still useful,
if used with a modicum of care.
He walked it every day and felt he knew it
in all its subtle nuances until one day
he was awakened by the loud sounds
of jackhammers attacking the crumbling concrete.
City workers were tearing it up to replace it
with a brand new, characterless sidewalk.
He watched them from his window for a while
feeling the jackhammers’ pneumatic jabs
as if piercing his own side as he and the sidewalk
were each falling to pieces and he knew
that by the end of day, both he and the sidewalk
would exist no more.