This lyric paints a visceral portrait of heartbreak and displacement, where the coldness of the cityscape mirrors the emotional desolation within. The narrator, freezing and adrift in a hellish urban environment of soaring rents and indifferent landlords, directly ties their personal homelessness to a systemic one, where people are "being fleeced-in." This external crisis frames the internal one, as the physical chill of the night parallels the emotional freeze-out from a former lover, Martha, who lives comfortably "down the river," seemingly untouched by the same struggles.

The core of the pain is crystallized in the recurring chorus, which serves as a bittersweet anchor to a lost past. The memories of shared fires, makeshift homes, and beloved friends are abruptly undercut by the brutal reveal of "desertion" and "cheating." This refrain structures the narrative, each return emphasizing how the warmth of that communal past has been irrevocably poisoned by betrayal, making the present isolation even more acute.

The final verses sharpen the focus on the asymmetrical fallout of the relationship. The narrator is left hunting through sidewalks, marked by a public slap ("the scene of the crime"), while Martha is observed moving on, insulated by privilege on Park Street and humming a new tune with a "clown." The piece ends not with reconciliation, but with the enduring, churning energy of unforgiveness, linking the personal injustice to the broader economic one, where the narrators are left out in the cold—both literally and figuratively—by those who have moved on unscathed.

Crossing Classes

Collection of songwriters under the leadership of Bill Kinlough

Crossing Classes

The Great Unwashed