Fire Escape

When we moved there in 2001, my mother,

in wonder, remarked she'd never seen

so many slate roofs in one place.

A focus of industry once the canals were dug:

an orchestra of lumber and a cotillion of granite

brought through the port and floated

south to New York, or north to Montreal.

Richness followed, while the music lasted,

and postbellum mansions were built

on the dais of hills above the harbor.

Some even had glassed-in widow's walks,

death-flues in house fires

and eventually outlawed for that fact.

My first apartment was not one of these manses,

but an Edwardian white elephant converted

into eight units. I lived there for four years.

The ceiling leaked. The walls were thin,

and I needed two space heaters to survive

the hard winters. The fire escape

was a tacked-on white staircase cobbled together

from untreated wood. Maintenance never fixed

the heating, and my landlady said she'd sue me

when I told new tenants of this fact.

At New Year's I'd watch the fireworks

from the fire escape window, and in summer

I'd use it to slink back into my apartment

whenever I'd forgotten or lost my house-keys.

In my third year of renting, a stranger left

a naked sapling in a white plastic bucket

on the fire escape landing. The tree was long-dead,

and the pot filled with rock salt.

I did not touch it, and I never used the fire escape

after its appearance. It sat barren for two years,

and remained after I left.

Author's Note

Published by The Queens Review, Spring 2025 Issue:
https://thequeensreview.org/fire-escape-by-sean-eaton/
Full issue: https://thequeensreview.org/spring-2025-issue/