Best Poems About / On CHICAGO
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37.
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Brass Spittoons
Clean the spittoons, boy.
Detroit,
Chicago,
Atlantic City,
Palm Beach.
Clean the spittoons.
The steam in hotel kitchens,
And the smoke in hotel lobbies,
And the slime in hotel spittoons:
Part of my life.
Hey, boy!
A nickel,
A dime,
A dollar,
Two dollars a day.
Hey, boy!
A nickel,
A dime,
A dollar,
Two dollars
Buy shoes for the baby.
House rent to pay.
Gin on Saturday,
Church on Sunday.
My God!
Babies and gin and church
And women and Sunday
All mixed with dimes and
Dollars and clean spittoons
And house rent to pay.
Hey, boy!
A bright bowl of brass is beautiful to the Lord.
Bright polished brass like the cymbals
Of King Davids dancers,
Like the wine cups of Solomon.
Hey, boy!
A clean spittoon on the altar of the Lord.
A clean bright spittoon all newly polished
At least I can offer that.
Commere, boy!
Langston Hughes
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38.
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route 66
LA to Chicago
eight state snake
the road not traveled
any more
Wind Wing Widows
orphans to time
passing lanes
sights, sounds, signs
road, motels, cafes
lost to memory
cracked black asphalt
white flight concrete
ribboned heaves
heat wave weaves
lines ride white hot
Silver Shadow
Rolls no longer
Merging lanes and Chevy dreams
Fords no longer scream
down route 66
Flagstaff arid breezes belch
neon burps:
Blue Swallow Motel
100% Refrigerated Air
Vacancy, TV
Whiting Brothers
Phillips 66
while tires sing
desert songs:
Burma Shave
Last Chance for Gas
somewhere my America
tumbled
weed like rolling
Left blinker on
turning Right.
Astral Shepherd
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39.
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This Moment
This moment on the road
St. Louis to Chicago
on a sunny day,
AC breze in my face,
hat band a little tight on my head, brim
coming down into my field of vision,
pen in hand, notebook
poised on the steering wheel,
specks of dirt on the windshield,
my body at perfect
rest on the cushioned seat
as the soothing green
corn and trees slide by
on both sides of the highway,
120 miles from St. Louis,180 to Chi,
2250 since I left California,
58 years,4 1/2 months
since the day of my birth
& who knows, till my death,
this moment in time,
many joys and horrors
vanished beyond
the horizon of the past,
their titrations residing as memories
this moment
I am competely happy
Max Reif
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40.
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Chicago
Chicago ice nights
on the Loop
peering into windows
of great steaks & chops
smelling glorious
bread & butter
melting in the snowdrifts
tasting frostbitten salads
of the South Side
& warming in the glow
of a Greyhounds exhaust
drinking steamy coffee
over gloomy
manhole covers
& sampling
apple pie in
dark alleys
of Cicero.
frozen stars crackling
in December wind
snowflakes covering
the very moon-
i head west
Terry L. Young
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