Walking the Dog [a poem]

I head to the stove for a movie time companion
I see the furry shih tzu google-eyed stare and remember
It was six hours ago I last felt feces squish in my hand a plastic bag
So I grab my shoes
The muffled yap and gruntled yips
Nip my heels as we head out the door
The building smells stale of old linoleum and sloughed old skin cells
We hit the streets
The sidewalks dirty and spotted with old gum like a dalmation
The streetlight catches glass shards and sets them to sparkle
It is garbage night
Black plastic bags lie in heaps like old memories
And we stop at each pile
For sniffs and drops and drips
Startled we see the twitch of thin tails disappear under parked cars
We turn the corner
The blocks have quieted the iron lattice shutters pulled down
We slide down concrete quarters
Over pavement drizzled with drainage and air conditioned moisture
Tires move past us like a wave lapping at a sand bank
We turn the corner and notice a man with his head down sitting amongst the rubbish
I pull the leash taut
We walk a block passing the occasional person in shadowed doorway
Or sitting on the stoop
We turn the corner again and notice a train has just let out
Here the lights drench the pavement
The air is caked with smells of fried donuts and chicken
Passers-by and a familiar face
We stop to talk about our day and the gentrification
Neon stains the air fuzzy
We bid farewell and walk onward
Every four feet we stop for a scent
The side walk dusty and dingy
We pass the corner deli and turn
On our block the feeling of the unknown subsides a little
The buildings look as if sagging like cardboard boxes left in the rain
The air at once thick with the summer humid and a thin fall chill
As if the seasons having a brief dance together before moving past one another
Water streams horizontally past our feet running towards its eventual freedom
Just a few more steps past a few more steps
My keys scratching to find their niche
Up stairs that wail of their burden
And through the last door