Winter's Refugees

Your intelligent mind informs you to
simply ignore that uneasy feeling emanating
from your subconscious that on the evidence
of your eyes and ears the street you call
home has been transported to a grim
medieval winter village, residents huddling
fearfully in their huts seeking warmth
and comfort from the fearsome winter
elements ravaging the landscape. There
may be some truth in this since it has been
quite a long time since you've seen any of
those neighbours out and about. Are they
still there? Are they shuddering in fear
of the monster Grendel who made his
dreadful reputation in Beowulf and has
transferred his presence to your sleepy
street burdened by impassable snow and ice
assailed by ravaging wind and ice-storms
transforming the street to a medieval
fiefdom of fire-breathing beasts slithering
from house to house while residents shiver
and shake within? Miraculously garbage
is set out, the empty cans retrieved and no
one seen to furtively engage, so perhaps
there is, after all, a rational explanation?