The two of us sitting in my warm car idling,

your empty idling car warming alongside.

You in a party dress, risen from the garden.

Me in a work shirt, a rust-belt city in decline.

The question is how to not make it work.

We have answered it well and windows

in nearby houses offer us only the dark.

A flash freeze is descending on the east.

Hundreds of years of trouble ran us down.

You in terrible bloom, me in architectural ruin.

The downhearted city is filling now with snow.

It would be beautiful in someone else’s mind.