“It snows and still the derelicts go carrying sandwich boards.”
The first sentence shows the setting of the whole poems and the name of the poem indicates now is December in winter at 3:00 A.M. “Still derelicts” shows that the weather is harsh and “carrying sandwich boards” proclaims that poor people still tried to earn money and draw people attention.
“one proclaiming the end of the world the other the rates of a local barbershop.”
The poor people tried to draw others attention by using negative apocalyptic prophesies as well as cheap advertisement. The phenomena indirectly reveals that the economics at that time was crashing and citizens didn’t live a life which had enough financial support.
“One could not see her face Bundled up as she was and furtive. She went as if wind-swept, as if crow-winged.”
A series of the describing displays a image that a woman sneaked around that just like theft to do the work. “She went as if wind-swept, as if crow-winged” describes the postures of the old woman and stimulates the reader's interest to find out what she is want to do.
